Opinion ID: 4561954
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 1

Heading: The partnership and the complaints

Text: In 2011, Jeffrey Stahl, Kelly Evans, and John Venditto formed a Delaware limited liability partnership named JKJ (after their three first initials). Venditto and Stahl were doctors, and Evans was a former sales representative at Sanofi-Aventis. The partnership’s sole purpose was to prosecute a qui tam False Claims Act suit against Sanofi-Aventis and Bristol-Myers Squibb, two pharmaceutical companies that developed and marketed the anti-clotting drug Plavix. So JKJ filed this suit in federal district court. The gist of the suit was that Sanofi and Bristol had promoted Plavix to treat a broad range of patients, even though they knew that many of them would reap little if any benefit. Sanofi and Bristol’s marketing, JKJ alleged, caused many false claims to be submitted for federal and state healthcare reimbursement. JKJ alleged False Claims Act claims on behalf of the United States, as well as claims on behalf of dozens of states under their own qui tam statutes. 4 The complaints named JKJ as the sole plaintiff-relator. While the early complaints discussed the three partners’ backgrounds, they did not name them, using pseudonyms instead. The United States declined to intervene in the suit. By 2016, the partners’ relations had apparently soured. Venditto left and was replaced by Dr. Paul Gurbel. The second amended complaint, the one at issue, was filed in 2017 and names all three partners. But it still names JKJ as the sole relator. The partners viewed the old JKJ partnership as the same entity as the new one. That theory would be tested in this suit’s pinball journey among three different state and federal courts.