Whistleblower Law Blog

TweetAccording to the Government Accountability Project’s blog, D.C. Superior Court Judge Leonard Braman held that a recent amendment to the D.C. Whistleblower Protection Act (WPA) exempting whistleblowers from the requirement of notifying the District of a claim within six months of the adverse employment action should apply retroactively.  Therefore, the notice requirement in D.C. Code [...]

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TweetThe Attorney General of New York has settled its lawsuit against Sodexo, a provider of school lunches, for $20 million.  Two whistleblowers, John and Jay Carciero, filed the qui tam action alleging Sodexo received illegal kickbacks from the vendors it selected for school lunch programs.  Under New York law, whistleblowers are entitled to a reward [...]

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TweetAccording to the Wall Street Journal, Senate leaders – motivated by a recent salmonella outbreak and massive egg recall – will likely bring their version of the Food Safety Modernization Act to a vote in the full Senate on September 13.  Click here for a copy of Senate Bill S. 510.  The House has already passed [...]

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TweetAccording to Time, the new SEC whistleblower reward program established by the Dodd-Frank Act will likely lead to a substantial increase in the reporting of fraud and other wrongdoing by public companies to the SEC.  Under the previous SEC reward program, the SEC granted rewards between 0% and 10% to whistleblowers at the SEC’s discretion.  [...]

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TweetAccording to an article in Politico, the Congressional Whistleblower Protection Act introduced by Senators Chuck Grassley (R-Iowa) and Claire McCaskill (D-Missouri) has yet to be reported to the full Senate and continues to languish in the Committee on Homeland Security and Government Affairs.  Similar to the Whistleblower Protection Act which protects most federal employees who [...]

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TweetAccording to an article in The Washington Post, the whistleblower provisions of the Dodd-Frank Act (DFA), which provide a substantial incentive to report financial fraud, are expected to generate a substantial increase in whistleblower litigation.  The DFA requires the SEC and Commodity Futures Trading Commission (CFTC) to provide a financial reward to whistleblowers who provide [...]

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TweetOn August 13, 2010, The Employment Law Group® filed an amicus curiae brief in Johnson v. Siemens Building Technologies, Inc., on behalf of the Government Accountability Project, National Employment Lawyers Association, and National Whistleblowers Center arguing that Section 929A of the Dodd-Frank Act clarifies and confirms existing law on the scope of coverage under SOX, [...]

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TweetIn Vinnett v. Mitsubishi Power Systems, the Department of Labor Administrate Review Board held that employees who report nuclear safety concerns engage in protected conduct under Section 211 of the Energy Reorganization Act (ERA) regardless of whether they are blowing the whistle in the course of performing their job duties.  The ARB states: [T]here is [...]

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TweetThe Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) filed an amicus curiae brief asserting that Congress intended Section 806 of the Sarbanes-Oxley Act (SOX) to protect whistleblowers working for consolidated subsidiaries of publicly-traded companies.  The SEC states: The [SEC] believes that the whistleblower protections of Section 806 apply not only to employees of parent companies that file [...]

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TweetJudge Anderson of the Eastern District of Virginia ordered Nelnet, Sallie Mae, and other defendants in a qui tam whistleblower action to explore potential resolution of Jon Oberg’s claim, which we blogged about here.   One of the defendants, Brazos Higher Education Service Corp., settled the action last week.  The plaintiff is represented by Wiley Rein [...]

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TweetThe Solicitor of Labor filed an amicus curiae brief arguing that in enacting Section 806 of Sarbanes-Oxley Act (SOX), Congress intended to protect whistleblowers working for the consolidated subsidiaries of publicly-traded companies.  In Klopfenstein v. PCC Flow Technologies Holdings, Inc., the ARB applied an “agency test” in which the general common law of agency is employed [...]

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TweetWTOP reports that Nebraska-based Nelnet, Sallie Mae, and several other student loan companies are exploring a potential resolution of a qui tam whistleblower lawsuit brought by TELG client Jon Oberg accusing them of defrauding the federal government.  Jon Oberg, a former Department of Education researcher, filed the lawsuit on behalf of the federal government under [...]

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TweetThe Ethics Resource Center conducted a study titled Retaliation: The Cost to Your Company and Its Employees showing that employers’ efforts to reduce employee misconduct are insufficient absent the adoption of a strong anti-retaliation policy.  The study concludes that employers should promote ethical behavior and adopt a strong anti-retaliation policy in order to improve the [...]

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TweetJustice Procaccini commended the defendant’s counsel and The Employment Law Group® law firm’s attorneys R. Scott Oswald and David Scher for their excellent trial work. With the completion of the O’Neill v. Warwick trial marking Procaccini’s ninth anniversary on the bench, the Warwick Beacon reported that: Procaccini told the court that he loves his work [...]

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TweetA jury for the Superior Court of Kent County in Rhode Island found Warwick Public School District not liable under the Rhode Island Whistleblower Protection Act (WPA) for the wrongful termination of Mary Katherine O’Neill, a client of The Employment Law Group®.  School administrators fired Ms. O’Neill following an interview she gave to a local [...]

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TweetOn September 21, 2010, Jason Zuckerman, a Principal at The Employment Law Group® law firm will speak at the ALI-ABA Fall 2010 seminar on the whistleblower provisions of the recently enacted Dodd-Frank Wall Street Reform and Consumer Protection Act, which we blogged about here.  Zuckerman will discuss Sections 1057, 922 and 748 of the Dodd-Frank [...]

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TweetThe U.S. District Court for the District of Massachusetts held that an employee is protected from retaliation under the retaliation provision of the False Claims Act when reporting any activity that reasonably could lead to a False Claims Act (FCA) suit even when the employee is completely unaware of the FCA.  Plaintiff Christopher Gobble was [...]

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TweetThe House of Representatives passed the Offshore Oil and Gas Worker Whistleblower Protection Act, which prohibits oil and gas companies from terminating or discriminating against offshore employees who report unsafe conditions or refuse to work in unsafe conditions.  Closing a significant loophole, the legislation extends whistleblower protections currently in place for onshore oil and gas [...]

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