Opinion ID: 221854
Heading Depth: 3
Heading Rank: 1

Heading: Modification Five's Co-production Program Line Item

Text: Showing the objective falsity of the price contained in Modification Five's co-production program line item, however, is not as simple a task as establishing the falsity of a statement of historical fact. A statement may be deemed false for purposes of the False Claims Act only if the statement represents an objective falsehood. Wilson, 525 F.3d at 376, citing Lamers, 168 F.3d at 1018. Although a breached contractual term may be considered a falsehood in a looser sense  a false promise  a mere breach of a contractual duty does not satisfy this standard. See United States ex rel. Garst v. Lockheed-Martin Corp., 328 F.3d 374, 378 (7th Cir. 2003) (observing that a mere fail[ure] to keep one's promise is just breach of contract, not fraud); Harrison v. Westinghouse Savannah River Co., 176 F.3d 776, 789 (4th Cir.1999) (affirming dismissal where allegations showed only poor and inefficient management of contractual duties). Nor do mere differences in interpretation growing out of a disputed legal question involving the terms of a contract. See Lamers, 168 F.3d at 1018. To establish the objective falsity of the coproduction line item price in Modification Five, Yannacopoulos needed to present evidence showing that Greece did not in fact agree to pay [that amount] for the items and services to be delivered under the coproduction line item. [18] None of the evidence on which Yannacopoulos relies is sufficient to show either the falsity of the coproduction line item price in Modification Five or Lockheed's knowledge of that falsity. Much of that evidence shows, at best, that General Dynamics and Greece reached other agreements regarding the co-production program before Modification Five was executed. But nothing about those agreements prevented Lockheed and Greece from reaching a new agreement when they negotiated the final terms of Modification Five. The parties to the original agreement were not bound to follow that agreement even after both agreed that it was not in their best interests to do so. Yannacopoulos also claims that General Dynamics collected millions of dollars for work on the co-production program that was not yet completed at the time Modification Five was signed, but we fail to see how this goes to show that Greece did not actually agree to pay the price set forth in that modification. The remainder of the evidence on which he relies  the decrease in demand for F-16 parts and General Dynamics' decision to no longer submit invoices in relation to the co-production program  suffer from that same failing. None of it could enable a reasonable jury to conclude that the price of the co-production program line item in Modification Five was objectively false, in the sense that Greece did not actually agree to pay the price set forth in that line item.