Texas Attorney General Greg Abbott announced on September 9, 2008, that his office had reached a $28 million dollar settlement with Abbott Laboratories. The relator-whistleblower in the case, Ven-a-Care, provided insider information resulting in the successful recovery of fraudulently obtained funds for the government.
Texas Attorney General Abbott is one of several progressive state officials who is aggressively working to protect the public fisc from fraudsters. Texas passed its version of the federal false claims act years ahead of most states, and the Texas law adopts many provisions of the federal FCA. Passage of state false claims acts are important to those interested in protecting state tax dollars; the state FCAs allow a state to intervene in an action, to have its interest recognized, to recover funds, and to reward deserving whistleblowers.
AG Abbott dramatically expanded both the state's Civil Medicaid Fraud Section and the Medicaid Fraud Control Unit. Texas, as a result of these efforts, has recovered more than $200 million since Abbott took office.
Hopefully, more states will follow Texas's example and pass a state level FCA. Only 22 states have enacted some form of the FCA as of today. Why more states do not enact a state level FCA is a mystery. What state and which taxpayers, in today's economy, can't benefit from a recovery of $200 million?
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
Posts
No comments:
Post a Comment