The Department of Justice recovered a record-breaking $5.69 billion under the False Claims Act for the fiscal year 2014, says a DOJ statement released Thursday.
Qui tam (whistleblower) lawsuits accounted for almost $3 billion of the total, with whistleblowers receiving $435 million in rewards.
“We acknowledge the men and women who have come forward to blow the whistle on those who would commit fraud on our government programs,” said Acting Assistant Attorney General Joyce Branda.
As has been the case in other recent years, the pharma industry accounted for a substantial share of the recoveries. Global health care giant Johnson & Johnson and its subsidiaries, Janssen Pharmaceuticals and Scios (J&J), paid a total of $2.2 billion to resolve False Claims Act claims and other charges relating to the off-label marketing of prescription drugs and kickbacks to physicians and nursing homes.
Recoveries under the False Claims Act now total more than $45 billion, including more than $30 billion from qui tam cases alone.