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In this episode, host Jonathan Havens, co-chair of Saul Ewing Arnstein & Lehr’s Food, Beverage and Agribusiness (FBA) Practice, speaks with Tony Pavel, Senior Food Lawyer and Global Food Law Team Leader at Cargill, a global food, agricultural, financial and industrial products company. These former colleagues discuss how food law has grown more complicated over the years, particularly in relation to FDA’s Food Safety Modernization Act (FSMA), traceability, the increasing globalization of supply chains, and consumers demanding labeling transparency and vast product information. They also discuss potential regulatory changes on the horizon given both technological advances in data-driven areas, such as rapid testing, and the beginning of the Biden Administration.
Topics:
Last month, the U.S. Supreme Court denied certiorari in a case concerning the “first-to-file” bar under the False Claims Act.
In late January, the Eleventh Circuit reversed the Northern District of Alabama in U.S. ex rel. Marsteller et al. v. Tilton et al., and revived a whistleblower suit relating to the sale of helicopters under the U.S. foreign military sale (“FMS”) program.
In United States v. Luce, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Seventh Circuit recently held that a plaintiff suing under the False Claims Act (“FCA”), 31 U.S.C. § 3729 et seq., must demonstrate not merely that the government suffered a loss that it would not otherwise have suffered without the false claims (i.e., “but for” causation), but also that the government’s loss was the reasonably foreseeable result of the false claims (i.e., “proximate causation”).
In United States ex rel. Barko v. Halliburton Co. et al., a qui tam suit we previously covered here, the District of Columbia Circuit Court of Appeals once again ruled that defense contractor KBR Inc.’s internal investigation documents were privileged, rejecting for the second time the District Court ’s decision to the contrary.
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This month, a federal jury found former defense contractor Armet Armored Vehicles, Inc. not liable in a False Claims Act (“FCA”) lawsuit that alleged the company overcharged the federal government for armored vehicles by shipping defective vehicles and failing to deliver all the vehicles ordered.
The U.S. Supreme Court today issued its ruling in Kellogg Brown & Root Services, Inc., et al. v. United States ex. rel. Carter, a case we reported on previously (/blogs/whistleblower-wire/4528). The Court was asked to decide 1) whether the Wartime Suspension of Limitations Act (“WSLA”), 18 U.S.C. § 3287, applies to FCA claims to toll the statute of limitations when the U.S. is at war; and 2) whether the FCA’s first-to-file bar, found at 31 U.S.C.
The Securities and Exchange Commission this week announced its first victory in a case where it accused a defendant of stifling potential whistleblowers. Houston-based contractor KBR, Inc. was alleged to have used confidentiality agreements that could have prevented current or former employees from reporting securities violations to the commission without first getting approval from KBR's legal department.
In Brief:
On January 12, 2015, the U.S. Supreme Court heard oral argument in Kellogg Brown & Root Services, Inc., et al. v. United States ex. rel. Carter, a pivotal False Claims Act case, which Saul Ewing’s White Collar and Government Enforcement Practice first discussed in August 2014. In that case, which arises from a qui tam claim advanced by Benjamin Carter against his former employer, Kellogg Brown & Root (KBR), the court is considering two important issues.