Source: https://www.fraudwhistleblowersblog.com/2016/03/
Timestamp: 2019-04-22 14:51:44+00:00

Document:
On March 28, the U.S. District Court for the District of South Carolina advanced a plaintiff-friendly interpretation of the False Claims Act’s (“FCA’s”) first-to-file rule. It recognized that naming new defendants who are related to defendants named in previously filed complaint and complicit in the alleged fraud renders the subsequent complaint sufficiently different to pass muster under the rule.
The first-to-file rule, 31 U.S.C. § 3730(b)(5), provides that “no other person than the Government may intervene or bring a related action based on the facts underlying the pending action.” In many U.S. Circuits, including the Fourth, where the District of South Carolina sits, courts apply the “same material elements” test, meaning that a relator is not “first to file” if his complaint describes the same material elements of a fraud documented in a previously filed complaint.
United States ex rel. Lutz v. Berkeley HeartLab, Inc., et al., No. 9:14-cv-230 (D.S.C.), is an FCA case in which three separate qui tam actions were consolidated for government intervention. The three complaints – one filed by relators Scarlett Lutz and Kayla Webster, one filed by relator Michael Mayes, and one filed by relator Chris Reidel – allege a nationwide scheme in which physicians were offered and paid kickbacks to order often-medically-unnecessary tests from diagnostic laboratories (Berkeley HeartLab, Health Diagnostic Laboratory, Inc. [“HDL”], and Singulex, Inc.), through a marketing agent (BlueWave Healthcare Consultants), in violation of the FCA. Government healthcare programs then reimbursed the laboratories for those impermissible payments. Mayes filed his complaint first, Reidel’s complaint followed, and Lutz and Webster filed their complaint thereafter. Unlike Mayes and Reidel, Lutz and Webster named the individuals who concocted, directed, and implemented the scheme – as opposed to only the corporate entities they represent – as defendants.
Notably for future relators, the court’s analysis suggests that the addition of any defendant – except for a subsidiary of a previously named defendant – will defeat the first-to-file rule, as long as their involvement in fraud can be documented with particularity. Each relator should thus draft her complaint as broadly as the facts allow, in order to support the identification and naming of all parties involved in the fraud alleged. Doing so will increase the odds that the relator’s complaint names and inculpates different defendants – and thus, under the Lutz court’s analysis, alleges different material elements – than any potentially related and previously filed complaint.
Last week, in Tyson Foods v. Bouaphakeo, — S. Ct. —-, 2016 WL 1092414, the U.S. Supreme Court affirmed a district court decision certifying a class of workers who sued Tyson Foods under the Fair Labor Standards Act (“FLSA”) and Iowa state labor law for short-changing them the time it took to change in and out of their protective gear, thus unlawfully depriving them of overtime pay. To establish that the “donning” and “doffing” of protective gear pushed them over the 40-hour overtime threshold, the workers used sampling evidence. An expert videotaped a representative number of employees donning and doffing the gear, calculated the average time that the process lasted, and applied that number on a class-wide basis.
Tyson appealed the order granting certification, contending that the time it took employees to change in and out of protective gear was an individual question that substantially predominated the class-wide issues, and that the use of sampling evidence “assum[ed] away the very differences that make the case inappropriate for classwide resolution.” Tyson sought a ruling not only that the use of sampling evidence was inappropriate in this case, but also that it was necessarily an improper means of establishing liability in a class action.
The Court, in a 6-2 opinion, rejected Tyson’s arguments. “A representative or statistical sample,” it concluded, “is a means to establish or defend against liability. Its permissibility turns not on the form a proceeding takes—be it a class or individual action—but on the degree to which the evidence is reliable in proving or disproving the elements of the relevant cause of action. Indeed, “[i]n many cases, a representative sample is the only practicable means to collect and present relevant data establishing a defendant’s liability.” This, the Court held, was one such case.
Thus, in Boutaphakeo, the Supreme Court seemingly endorsed the proposition set forth in Martin: where it is impractical to “collect and present” all of the false claims at issue, presenting a “representative sample” may suffice in establishing a defendant’s liability.
On Monday, February 29, 2016, the Justice Department announced that the Lockheed Martin Corporation and its subsidiaries Lockheed Martin Energy Systems and Lockheed Martin Utility Services (collectively, Lockheed Martin) agreed to pay the United States $5 million to resolve allegations that they violated the Resource Conservation and Recovery Act (RCRA). By misrepresenting their compliance with RCRA to the Department of Energy (DOE), Lockheed Martin knowingly submitted false claims for payment under its contracts with DOE to operate the Paducah Gaseous Diffusion Plant in Paducah, Kentucky. Lockheed Martin is a global security, aerospace, and information technology corporation that provides environmental services to the government and commercial customers.
The RCRA is a statute that establishes how hazardous wastes are managed. The government’s lawsuit alleged that Lockheed Martin violated the RCRA by failing to identify and report hazardous waste produced and stored at the facility, and failing to properly handle and dispose of the waste. Furthermore, the government alleged that this conduct resulted in false claims for payment under Lockheed Martin’s contracts with the DOE.
Of the $5 million settlement, Lockheed Martin will pay $4 million to resolve the government’s False Claims Act allegations and its subsidiaries will pay $500,000 each in RCRA civil penalties.
From 1984 to 1999, Lockheed Martin operated the Paducah Gaseous Diffusion Plant under contracts with the DOE and a government corporation, the U.S. Enrichment Corporation. Lockheed was responsible for the facility’s uranium enrichment operations. Uranium enrichment, through a process called “gaseous diffusion,” increases the proportion of uranium atoms that can be used to produce nuclear fuel for weapons and civilian energy production.
In addition to uranium enrichment, Lockheed Martin was responsible for the environmental restoration, waste management, and custodial care of the site, which operates 3,500 acres in McCracken County, Kentucky. Uranium operations concluded at the plant in 2013. The government is working to remediate any contamination at and near the site consistent with the Comprehensive Environmental Response, Compensation, and Liability Act (CERCLA).
The lawsuit resolves two lawsuits filed under the qui tam provision of the False Claims Act. The lawsuits were filed by the Natural Resources Defense Council, Inc. and several former employees of Lockheed Martin who worked at the Paducah facility. The United States partially intervened in the lawsuits, which were then consolidated into one action. The whistleblowers will collectively receive $920,000 from the United States’ portion of the settlement.
The case was a coordination effort between the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the Western District of Kentucky, the Civil Division’s Commercial Litigation Branch, the Environment and Natural Resources Division’s Environmental Enforcement Section, the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, the Department of Energy and the Department of Energy Office of the Inspector General.
The case caption is: United States, ex rel. John David Tillson, Natural Resources Defense Council, Inc., et al. v. Lockheed Martin Corp., et al., Civil Action No. 5:99CV00170-GNS (W.D. Ky.). The claims resolved in this settlement are allegations only; there has been no determination of liability.
The U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit reversed a district court order dismissing the False Claims Act (“FCA”) lawsuit brought by Relator Steven Mateski against his former employer, Raytheon. The suit, which potentially exposes Raytheon to more than $1 billion in damages, is based on allegations that the company failed to comply with provisions of its contract with the government to develop a sensor for a meteorological satellite, covered up its noncompliance, and improperly billed the government for incomplete work.
The district court dismissed the case for lack of subject matter jurisdiction under the Public Disclosure Bar, 31 U.S.C. § 3730(e)(4)(A), which prohibits FCA suits that are “based upon the public disclosure of allegations or transactions.” Specifically, the court found that public documents, such as reports from the Government Accountability Office and various newspaper articles, described the rampant mismanagement and deviations from protocol that characterized the sensor project. The district court conceded that Mateski added detail to the publicly available information, but concluded that such amplification did not render the allegations sufficiently distinct to survive scrutiny under § 3730(e)(4)(A).
The Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals, however, held that the lower court had erroneously compared the Mateski complaint with the public documents at “the highest level of generality.” While the complaint and the documents both described problems with the project, Mateski provided the government with useful, “infinitely more precise” details that were lacking from the public documents, including numerous false waivers and certifications, as well as documentation of the use of substandard materials in production of the sensor. Barring his action, according to the Court, would upset the FCA’s carefully struck balance between encouraging private litigants to discover fraud, yet stifling parasitic lawsuits.
In deciding the matter, the Mateski Court expressly endorsed and adopted the “levels-of-generality” approach employed by the Seventh Circuit Court of Appeals. But Mateski also shares analytical common ground with the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Third Circuit’s recent decision in Moore & Company (also discussed on this blog). There, the Court held that the operative question under the Public Disclosure Bar was whether the relator’s allegations materially added to the “who, what, when, where, and how” of the events set forth in public documents. Although they frame the issue differently, both Mateski and Moore & Company strictly construe the Public Disclosure Bar to ensure that relators who add significant relevant details to fraud generally described in newspapers and other public documents retain the ability to pursue FCA claims on behalf of the federal government.
Ameri-Source International, Inc.; Ameri-Source Specialty Products, Inc.; Ameri-Source Holdings, Inc. and SMC Machining, LLC are Pennsylvania-based importers. Arjay Goel and Thomas Diener owned the first three companies while SMC Machining, Inc. was incorporated at Goel’s direction. The businesses and Goel and Diener were named as defendants in a False Claims Act lawsuit alleging that that they had schemed to avoid customs duties for the import of small-diameter graphic electrodes which were manufactured in the Peoples Republic of China. These electrodes are used as fuel in electric arc and ladle furnaces, such as those utilized in steel-making.
The government imposes what are known as antidumping duties to protect domestic manufacturers from foreign companies who import goods into the country at below cost prices. Imports of small-diameter graphite electrodes that are made in the Peoples Republic of China have been subject to antidumping duties since August 21, 2008. Custom duties are not charged for large-diameter electrodes.
The lawsuit, which was originally brought by whistleblower Graphite Electrode Sales, Inc., claimed that between December of 2009 and March of 2012, Ameri-Source International, Inc. evaded duties on 15 shipments of small-diameter graphite electrodes from the Peoples Republic of China by claiming that they were large-diameter electrodes. Goel, Diener and the other companies were said to have taken part in the misrepresentations. All of the defendants named in the suit have agreed to pay $3 million to settle the claims that were brought against them. This money will be applied to the lost antidumping duties that amount to $2,137,420. Graphite Electrode Sales, Inc. will receive approximately $480,000 as its share of the settlement.
Ameri-Source International also pled guilty to two counts of smuggling goods into the United States. It was ordered to pay a $250,000 fine.

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