In an unusual unanimous ruling, the United States Supreme Court recently upheld a whistleblower’s claim (Universal Health Services v. U.S. ex rel. Escobar). With the ruling, the Court affirmed the “implied certification theory” of liability under the False Claims Act (FCA), which permits contractors to be liable for fraud when they fail to disclose material…
Whistleblowers, who are individuals who report a person or organization engaged in an allegedly illicit activity, are protected from workplace retaliation under a number of federal and state laws, including the Occupational Safety and Health Act (OSHA), Sarbanes-Oxley and Dodd-Frank, the Clean Air Act, the California Whistleblower Protection Act, and many others. In other words,…
Retaliation in the workplace, whether imagined or not, continues to account for almost half of all employment claims filed with the EEOC. Last year, in 2015, 44.5% of the charges filed were for retaliation. In other words, a majority of disgruntled employees claim not that they were discriminated against, but that they received adverse treatment…