Opinion ID: 1226703
Heading Depth: 3
Heading Rank: 1

Heading: Details and Geographic Locations

Text: We agree with the district court that a relator cannot avoid § 3730(b)(5)'s first-to-file bar by simply adding factual details or geographic locations to the essential or material elements of a fraud claim against the same defendant described in a prior compliant. As the Third Circuit explained, a relator who merely adds details to a previously exposed fraud does not help reduce fraud or return funds to the federal fisc, because once the government knows the essential facts of a fraudulent scheme, it has enough information to discover related frauds. LaCorte, 149 F.3d at 234; see also Grynberg, 390 F.3d at 1279 (The pendency of [an] initial qui tam action ... blocks other private relators from filing copycat suits that do no more than assert the same material elements of fraud, regardless of whether those later complaints are able to marshal additional factual support for the claim.). Any construction of § 3730(b)(5) that focused on the details of the later-filed action would allow an infinite number of copycat qui tam actions to proceed so long as the relator in each case alleged one additional instance of the previously exposed fraud. This result cannot be reconciled with § 3730(b)(5)'s goal of preventing parasitic qui tam lawsuits. See Laird, 336 F.3d at 351. Under this framework, the district court properly dismissed Branch's allegations against State Farm. Rigsby specifically alleged that State Farm, in its capacity as a WYO insurer, reallocated claims on two Mississippi properties from wind damage to flood damage in a pernicious attempt to shift its costs to the federal fisc. Branch brought identical allegations against State Farm, except it also alleged facts concerning ten properties in neighboring Louisiana. Because Branch cannot avoid the preclusive effect of Rigsby by focusing on additional instances of fraud occurring in other geographic locations, § 3730(b)(5) applies to bar its allegations against State Farm. [10]