Opinion ID: 1226703
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 1

Heading: FCA Background

Text: We have discussed the procedural underpinnings of the FCA's qui tam provisions on prior occasions and thus do not repeat them here. See Riley v. St. Luke's Episcopal Hosp., 252 F.3d 749, 752-53 (5th Cir.2001) (en banc); Searcy v. Philips Elecs. N. Am. Corp., 117 F.3d 154, 160 (5th Cir.1997). It is sufficient to say that under certain circumstances, the FCA permits suits by private parties on behalf of the United States against anyone submitting a false claim to the government[.] United States ex rel. Laird v. Lockheed Martin Eng'g & Sci. Serv. Co., 336 F.3d 346, 351 (5th Cir.2003). The history of the FCA's qui tam provisions demonstrates repeated attempts by Congress to balance two competing policy goals. On the one hand, the provisions seek to encourage whistleblowers with genuinely valuable information to act as private attorneys general in bringing suits for the common good. Id. On the other hand, the provisions seek to discourage opportunistic plaintiffs from filing parasitic lawsuits that merely feed off previous disclosures of fraud. Id. To promote the latter goal, Congress has placed a number of jurisdictional limits on the FCA's qui tam provisions, including § 3730(b)(5)'s first-to-file bar. [7] Under this provision, if Branch's claim had already been filed by another, the district court lacked subject matter jurisdiction and was required to dismiss the action. Similar in purpose, the public disclosure bar prevents a private party from bringing a qui tam action regarding matters already the subject of public knowledge, unless that party is an original source of the information. [8] While the two concepts have a similar goal discouragement of parasitic lawsuitsthey have different requirements. Here, the district court ruled only on the first-to-file bar and did not reach the public disclosure bar. Thus, we begin with the first-to-file bar.