Whistleblower News From The Inside -- December 13, 2017

By the C|C Whistleblower Lawyer Team

South Dakota rancher settles FCA suit for $180K – Jason Sparling has settled allegations that he submitted a false application to the USDA under the Livestock Forage Disaster Program to obtain drought relief funds. The USDA determined that none of Sparling’s cattle were drought stricken, thus he did not qualify for the payments. USAO South Dakota

Pharmacy settles FCA suit for over $2M – A subsidiary of Med-Fast Pharmacy, Iserve technologies, has resolved both civil and criminal charges relating to a scheme to fill prescriptions for nursing home patients with recycled, unused drugs that were commingled at Med-Fast’s institutional pharmacy. The company has also settled allegations that it sought reimbursement for retail-packaged versions of diabetes testing strips, while actually supplying patients with cheaper mail-order-packaged versions of the strips. USAO Western District of Pennsylvania

Missouri legislature considering new whistleblower protections – The law would increase protections for public sector whistleblowers and protect them from retaliation. According to legislators, a previous law that made it harder to sue the state government for racial discrimination also stripped whistleblowers of these protections. St. Louis Post-Dispatch