Eric R. Havian

Eric R. Havian is a partner in the San Francisco office of Constantine Cannon LLP. He has extensive experience representing whistleblowers in qui tam lawsuits. He has also represented numerous local governments in False Claims Act matters, including the County of Los Angeles and the City of San Francisco. In 2010 California Lawyer Magazine named Mr. Havian a “California Lawyer of the Year.” In 2008 the National Law Journal named him as one of the Top 10 “Winning” Attorneys in the nation. He has been selected as one of the top 500 lawyers in America by Lawdragon and one of the top lawyers in Northern California by Superlawyers from 2005 through 2016. He was named to “Who’s Who in America” for 2014 and named by Corporate International as a “Global Awards Winner 2017 for Whistleblower Lawyer of the Year in California.”

Mr. Havian was lead counsel for the whistleblower in a 2019 case that settled for $362 million in criminal and civil fines, the largest ever antitrust whistleblower case. The case involved a ten-year bid-rigging scheme by the largest oil companies in South Korea, and resulted in criminal guilty pleas by five companies and the indictment of seven individuals. Mr. Havian was also lead counsel for the relator in a case that concluded in 2014 with the largest stand-alone kickback settlement ever, $400 million, against one of the largest dialysis companies in the country, DaVita. The case accused DaVita of paying kickbacks to doctors around the nation in exchange for patient referrals to DaVita clinics. He also led a 2009 action that resulted in the largest settlement ever paid by a defense contractor in a whistleblower case, $325 million, against Northrop Grumman for selling defective components for government satellites. In 2007 he was lead counsel representing a whistleblower and several schools and other public agencies, in a trial that resulted in a $225 million verdict against an electric utility for overcharging its government customers. He also represented a whistleblower and dozens of public agencies as lead counsel in a 13-year litigation that resulted in the 2009 payment of $90 million by companies selling high-lead waterworks parts to California municipalities. That case also resulted in several groundbreaking appellate decisions favoring whistleblowers. In 2013 Mr. Havian was lead counsel representing a whistleblower, several states, and numerous municipalities in a two-month jury trial, which resulted in a verdict that the largest PVC pipe manufacturer in the world had defrauded its customers over a ten-year period.

He is currently one of the lead attorneys representing a whistleblower in a suit against UnitedHealth Group involving allegations the company knowingly obtained inflated risk adjustment payments based on untruthful and inaccurate information about the health status of beneficiaries enrolled in UnitedHealth Group’s Medicare Advantage Plans.

Mr. Havian is a frequent speaker at conferences on the False Claims Act and qui tam lawsuits. He also has published articles about whistleblowing and government contract fraud as well as how the False Claims Act applies to fraud in the environmental field. He was actively involved in the legislation to enact a whistleblower law for securities law violations, and has written several published articles on the subject. Mr. Havian graduated cum laude in 1981 from Harvard Law School, where he was an oralist for the team that won the Ames Moot Court Competition. He was an Assistant United States Attorney in the Criminal Division of the U.S. Attorney’s Office in San Francisco from 1987 through 1994. In 1994, he opened the San Francisco office of Phillips & Cohen. He joined Constantine Cannon in March 2015. Mr. Havian has taught fraud seminars at Stanford Law School and Berkeley Law School. He is a former co-chair of the American Bar Association Health Law Litigation Committee.

Interviews