Volunteers of America does not have to face trial in a federal False Claims lawsuit after convincing a judge the national organization can’t be dragged into a case based on allegations against its Louisiana affiliate.
Former support coordinator Natasha Dixon sued VOA and Volunteers of America South Central Louisiana early last year, claiming she’d been pressured to deem nursing facility residents eligible for Medicaid enrollment. After taking complaints to local organization leaders and state officials, she was eventually fired in what she called “retaliation for engaging in protected whistleblower activity.”
In her lawsuit alleging violations of the federal False Claims Act and the Louisiana Medicaid Assistance Program Integrity Law, Dixon said within two months of stepping into an assessor job for the VOASCL, she’d been “repeatedly pressured” by a program manager to “lie on assessments … to keep their participant numbers up so that they could bill more to Medicaid.”
VOA asked the US District Court for Western Louisiana to dismiss the case against it because of a lack of jurisdiction. VOA is a nonprofit corporation headquartered in Virginia and said its only relationship to the Louisiana affiliate was as its parent company.
The national organization argued that Dixon failed to cite any specific action by it related to the allegations made against individuals at its Louisiana arm.
The court agreed, citing multiple federal rulings that found “a strong presumption of...
Volunteers of America does not have to face trial in a federal False Claims lawsuit after convincing a judge the national organization can’t be dragged into a case based on allegations against its...