i-law

International Construction Law Review

STATE AND LOCAL FALSE CLAIMS ACTS AND OTHER ANTI-FRAUD ACTS: A SURVEY FOR THE CONSTRUCTION PRACTITIONER

Deborah S Ballati and Richard Robinson

Farella Braun + Martel, San Francisco

1. INTRODUCTION

The Federal False Claims Act (the “Federal Act” or the “False Claims Act”) and its state and municipal counterparts provide potent weapons for governmental entities in their goal of protecting and ensuring the prudent use of public funds. These laws seek to address fraud against government entities, a problem that some commentators insist is widespread and uniquely difficult to identify.1 Because federal, state, and local governments control the expenditure of large sums of money, they are arguably more likely to be victims of fraud and less likely to catch those responsible. This problem can be exacerbated by a perceived or actual lack of resources available to government entities to identify fraud and prosecute perpetrators.2
The various state, federal and local false claims acts attempt to deal with these issues by (1) increasing the consequences of fraud on the government through multiple damages (for example, treble damages), statutory penalties, and debarment (among other things); and (2) empowering private individuals to bring claims on behalf of the government and participate in any recovery. The results can be remarkably lucrative. In 2014, the Department of Justice announced that it recovered nearly US$6 billion from False Claims Act civil filings during the 2014 fiscal year alone.3


Pt 3] State and Local False Claims Acts

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