Qui Tam Actions (Litigator Series)

THIS CASEBOOK contains a selection of 149 U. S. Court of Appeals decisions that analyze issues arising from qui tam actions. The selection of decisions spans from 2004 to the date of publication. For each circuit, the cases are listed in the order of frequency of citation. The most cited decisions appear first.



The False Claims Act prescribes penalties for claims submitted to the government that are known to be false. While encouraging citizens to act as whistleblowers, the Act also seeks to prevent parasitic lawsuits based on previously disclosed fraud. See United States ex rel. St. John LaCorte v. Smith-Kline Beecham Clinical Labs., Inc., 149 F.3d 227, 233 (3d Cir.1998). To reconcile these conflicting goals, the FCA has placed jurisdictional limits on its qui tam provisions, including § 3730(b)(5)'s first-to-file bar and § 3730(e)(4)'s public disclosure provision. US ex rel. Carter v. Halliburton Co., 710 F. 3d 171 (4th Cir. 2013)



Under the first-to-file bar, if [the plaintiff's] claims ha[ve] been previously filed by another relator, then the district court lack[s] subject matter jurisdiction. By the same token, the public disclosure bar prevents a relator from bringing an action if the matters therein have already been made public knowledge, except if the person is an original source of the information. Although the provisions promote the same goals, they have different requirements. US ex rel. Carter v. Halliburton Co., ibid.