Government Enforcement Actions

April 24, 2014

Monica Patrice Carter, owner of the Baton Rouge pharmacy Community Pharmacy 1, pleaded guilty for directing a $2.2M Medicare fraud scheme where she paid employees of nursing homes and mental health facilities to collect and return unused prescription drugs which her pharmacy then repackaged and redistributed and billed Medicare as if they were being distributed for the first time – effectively billing Medicare twice for the same medications. DOJ

April 23, 2014

Showa Corp., a Japanese automotive parts manufacturer, agreed to plead guilty and pay a $19.9M criminal fine for its role in a conspiracy to fix prices and rig bids for pinion-assist type electric powered steering assemblies installed in cars sold in the US and elsewhere. DOJ

April 9, 2014

Hewlett-Packard Russia agreed to plead guilty to felony violations of the Foreign Corrupt Practices Act for bribing Russian government officials to secure a large technology contract with the Office of the Prosecutor General of the Russian Federation. In addition, the US entered into criminal resolutions with HP subsidiaries in Poland and Mexico relating to FCPA violations for contracts with Poland’s national police agency and Mexico’s state-owned petroleum company. In total, the three HP entities will pay more than $108M in criminal and regulatory penalties. DOJ

April 3, 2014

Kerr-McGee Corp. and its parent Anadarko Petroleum agreed to pay $5.15B to settle charges that Kerr-McGee fraudulently conveyed assets to evade liability for environmental clean-up at contaminated sites around the country. It is the DOJ’s largest environmental enforcement recovery on record.DOJ

March 24, 2014

Vahe Tahmasian, owner and operator of the Hollywood, CA-based durable medical equipment supply company Orthomed Appliance, was found guilty by a federal jury in Los Angeles for his role in a $1.5M Medicare fraud scheme. DOJ

March 19, 2014

Marubeni Corp., a Japanese trading company involved in power generation, pled guilty to violating the anti-bribery provisions of the Foreign Corrupt Practices Act (FCPA) and agreed to pay a criminal fine of $88M for its participation in a scheme to bribe high-ranking government officials in Indonesia to secure a lucrative power project. DOJ

March 19, 2014

Toyota agreed to pay $1.2B to resolve allegations of criminal wire fraud for misleading consumers by concealing and making deceptive statements about two safety issues affecting its vehicles which caused a type of unintended acceleration. It is the largest penalty of its kind ever imposed on an automotive company. DOJ

March 18, 2014

California attorney Christopher Rusch was sentenced to serve 10 months in prison for helping his clients Stephen M. Kerr and Michael Quiel, both businessmen from Phoenix, hide millions of dollars in secret offshore bank accounts at UBS and Pictet & Cie in Switzerland. DOJ

March 18, 2014

Alex Wisidagama, formerly employed by Glenn Defense Marine Asia, pleaded guilty to conspiracy to defraud the US for his role in a scheme to overbill the US Navy for ship husbanding services. His plea is the second in an expanding investigation into acts of alleged fraud and bribery committed by GDMA and several US Navy officers and personnel. DOJ

March 18, 2014

American Family Care Inc., a network of walk-in medical clinics with offices in Alabama, Tennessee and Georgia, agreed to pay $1.2M to resolve allegations under the False Claims Act that it knowingly submitted claims to Medicare for outpatient office visits that were billed at a higher rate than was appropriate. The settlement resolves a qui tam lawsuit filed by a former employee of American Family Care under the whistleblower provision of the False Claims Act. DOJ