Attorney Steve Lebau recently had the honor of representing Joe Stenaka, a dedicated career public servant and distinguished Veteran, in a whistleblower complaint against his supervisor at the U.S. Department of Veterans.

FedScoop broke the story, reporting:

"A Department of Veterans Affairs watchdog has dismissed three misconduct allegations against a top federal IT official brought by the agency’s former chief information security officer.

"According to two copies of a January report obtained exclusively by FedScoop, the VA’s Office of Accountability and Whistleblower Protection (OAWP) did not substantiate three complaints filed against Joseph Stenaka in October 2020 by Paul
Cunningham.

"Stenaka at the time of the complaint was executive director for information security operations within the department’s Office of Information and Technology (OIT), and in that role he reported directly to Cunningham. Both Cunningham and Stenaka have since
departed from their roles at the VA. …

"The allegations filed against Stenaka came just a month after the IT official submitted a protected whistleblower complaint in which he raised concerns about negotiations between Cunningham and software company Splunk over a cloud computing contract.
…

"In his whistleblower complaint at the time, Stenaka alleged that Cunningham gave up to 10 terabytes of perpetual licenses from an existing Splunk Perpetual Contract for a discount on a future Splunk SaaS cloud contract and received only 'pennies on the
dollar' for what the Splunk contract was worth.

"Stenaka suggested Cunningham’s comfortable relationship with Mark Jarek, the director of business development and strategy at Splunk, gave rise to inappropriate negotiations with Splunk and there was concern the VA would lose up to $170 million due to this.

"The U.S. Code forbids personnel action against any federal employee who discloses information in a bid to stop gross mismanagement, gross waste of funds, abuse of authority, or to highlight a substantial and specific danger to public health or safety."

As a result of this win, Mr. Stenaka’s personnel file remains unblemished and accurately reflects his stellar work. He was also awarded compensatory damages and attorney fees.

For the full story, click here.

If you might be the victim of whistleblower retaliation, the attorneys at Lebau & Neuworth might be able to help; contact us (410) 296-3030 or lebauneuworth.com/contact-us.

Lebau & Neuworth partner Richard Neuworth made a presentation on the important topic of Medical Negligence and The False Claims Act at the 2022 National American Association for Justice Convention.

His presentation included the significant overlap between medical negligence and the False Claims Act, which is now more important than ever in light of the COVID-19 pandemic.

The amount of federal spending associated with the pandemic, particularly in health care, has risen significantly in terms of spending and the areas associated with possible False Claims Act claims.

Lebau and Neuworth is well-equipped to assist you with any possible False Claims Act matter; if you need legal assitance, contact us at (410) 296-3030 or lebauneuworth.com/contact-us.

Lebau & Neuworth attorneys have represented whistleblowers who work for government contractors, hospitals, healthcare companies and non-profits and were terminated from their jobs for objecting to and/or complaining about their employers’ unlawful conduct. In 2018, we represented whistleblowers who obtained more than $13 million from a for-profit college for defrauding the government by changing students’ test scores and enrolling students with invalid high school ‘diplomas’ ordered online.

A powerful tool to assist our clients is the federal False Claims Act.

In 1986, Congress strengthened the Act by increasing incentives for whistleblowers to file lawsuits alleging false claims on behalf of the government. These whistleblower, or qui tam, actions comprise a significant percentage of the False Claims Act cases that are filed. If the government prevails in a qui tam action, the whistleblower, also known as the relator, typically receives a portion of the recovery ranging between 15% and 30%. Whistleblowers filed 598 qui tam suits in fiscal year 2021, and this past year the department reported settlements and judgments exceeding $1.6 billion in these and earlier-filed suits.

The Justice Department obtained more than $5.6 billion in settlements and judgments from civil cases involving fraud and false claims against the government in the fiscal year ending September 30, 2021 – the second-largest annual total in False Claims Act history and the largest since 2014. Settlement and judgments since 1986, when Congress substantially strengthened the civil False Claims Act, now total more than $70 billion.

Of the more than $5.6 billion in settlements and judgments reported by the Department of Justice this past fiscal year, over $5 billion relates to matters that involved the healthcare industry, including drug and medical-device manufacturers, managed-care providers, hospitals, pharmacies, hospice organizations, laboratories and physicians. The amounts included in the $5 billion reflect recoveries arising from only federal losses, and, in many of these cases, the department was instrumental in recovering additional amounts for state Medicaid programs.

If you or someone know needs whistleblower protection, please do not hesitate to call Lebau & Neuworth at (410) 296-3030 or email us at lebauneuworth.com/contact-us.

The Federal False Claims Amendments Act (FCA), which was signed into law on October 27, 1986, by President Ronald Reagan, just celebrated its 35th anniversary.

The FCA creates liability for fraud against the government. Specifically, the FCA allows the government to recover fraudulently earned funds from any person who knowingly submits, or causes another person to submit, a false claim to the government to get a false claim paid by the government. Violations of the FCA come with a civil penalty of between $11,181 and $22,363 for each false claim, and three times the amount of the government’s actual damages.

The attorneys at Lebau & Neuworth have handled numerous FCA cases on behalf of whistleblowers, with allegations of fraud including overcharging Medicare for services performed, charging Medicare for services that were never performed or performed by unqualified practitioners, fraudulently obtaining Title IV education funds, and fraud committed in obtaining military contracts.

The FCA incentivizes individuals with knowledge about fraud to come forward by including a whistleblower – or “qui tam” – provision that provides whistleblowers with a financial reward for successful FCA lawsuits. The FCA allows for whistleblower rewards between 15% and 25% of the amount recovered as a result of successful lawsuits.

That amount can be significant when millions of dollars are recovered due to false claim. For example, the Department of Justice (D.O.J.) obtained more than $2.2 billion in settlements and judgments from civil cases involving fraud and false claims against the government in the fiscal year ending Sept. 30, 2020,

Whistleblowers are also protected by the FCA because “qui tam” cases are filed confidentially in camera and under seal. That means the complaint and its contents must be kept confidential until the seal is lifted and the complaint is not served on the defendant. This protects both the whistleblower and the integrity of the D.O.J. investigation of the allegations.

If you have information about potential false claims, including Medicare fraud, the attorneys at Lebau & Neuworth may be able to help. We are experienced with FCA claims, so contact us (410) 296-3030 or lebauneuworth.com/contact-us.

As employment lawyers who solely represent workers – that is, executives to middle managers to hourly employees – the legal staff at Lebau & Neuworth regularly takes on cases in which a worker is aware of his or her employer engaging in fraud against the federal government and then is fired after protesting against the fraud.

These cases, filed under the U.S. False Claims Act, often take significant time and resources to resolve. Lebau & Neuworth is well-positioned to take on such cases in Maryland and across the country; in fact, we currently have governmental-fraud-related cases pending in Maryland, the District of Columbia, Tennessee and Massachusetts.

The U.S. Department of Justice just announced that for 2020 it obtained more than $2.2 billion in settlements and judgments from civil cases involving fraud and false claims against the government. More than $1.8 billion of the total recovery was attributable to cases involving healthcare fraud, while more than $1.6 billion of the total recovery came from cases filed by whistleblowers.

We fight for whistleblowers! If you know of any governmental fraud at the federal or state level in your place of employment, contact the lawyers at Lebau & Neuworth at (410) 296-3030 or lebauneuworth.com/contact-us.