100 Us Dollar Banknotes, representing False Claims Act

False Claims Act Whistleblowers Paid $392 Million in Fiscal Year 2017

A Big Year for the False Claims Act The Department of Justice recovered more then $3.7 billion in settlements and judgments in Fiscal Year 2017 from the False Claims Act according to the press release issued last week. The majority of the funds recovered were in lawsuits initiated by whistleblowers. Qui tam lawsuits led to...

Latest Settlement Reveals Mortgage Fraud Continued Years After Financial Crisis Ended

Mortgage Fraud Continues We are reaching the end of a decade since mortgage fraud hit its peak in 2007. However, the latest settlement by IberiaBank suggests that at least one lender continued aspects of mortgage fraud against the Federal Housing Administration (FHA) well after becoming informed of their wrongdoing. IberiaBank agreed to pay the United...

Cryptocurrency and a graph, representing cybersecurity

Evaluating Cryptocurrencies for Potentially Big Whistleblower Cases

Cryptocurrency, led by bitcoin, has become a hot topic in the mainstream media recently. Both the CME and Nasdaq have announced plans to introduce trading in bitcoin futures. And the investing community continues to be split between those who believe it is the future of currency and those who believe it is a bubble or,...

Bridge Over Body of Water, representing Wisconsin False Claims Act Repeal

Wisconsin False Claims Act Repeal Costs State $11 Million

An Expensive False Claims Act Repeal The Wisconsin Center for Investigative Journalism has estimated that the state of Wisconsin gave up $11 million when it weakened the Wisconsin False Claims Act and then repealed it as part of the 2015-2017 budget process. The Federal False Claims Act, 31 U.S.C. § 3729 et. seq., is the...

Magnifying Glass on Top of Document, representing accounting fraud

SEC Charges Rio Tinto with Big Accounting Fraud in 2017

SEC Charges Rio Tinto with Accounting Fraud The U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission has filed a complaint in the Southern District of New York alleging violations of the Securities Act and the Exchange Act for an accounting fraud related to the valuation of a coal business in Mozambique, Africa. Rio Tinto settled the investigation of...

Low Angle View of Office Building Against Sky, representing Reverse Mortgage Whistleblower

Reverse Mortgage Whistleblower Earns $1.6 Million Award

Reverse Mortgage Whistleblower Cashes In The $89 million settlement in May between Financial Freedom and the United States regarding claims under the False Claims Act and the Financial Institutions Reform, Recovery, and Enforcement Act of 1989 resulted in a $1.6 million bounty for a FIRREA whistleblower. The United States alleged that Financial Freedom failed to...

Bank buildings, representing Citigroup Accused of Spoofing

How 700 Bank Whistleblowers Get Ignored

700 Bank Whistleblowers Ignored Like much of America, we have been following the story of Wells Fargo’s sales tactics and the government response to it. We haven’t discussed this matter in depth yet here on our blog (just a brief comment about its implications for whistleblower retaliation), so I thought we would discuss it following...

Photovoltaic PV plant ground mounted with string inverters, highlighting clean energy fraud

A Review of Recent Damaging Clean Energy Fraud

Clean Energy Fraud All Around Us We have discussed the potential for whistleblower actions grounded in the protection of the environment and compliance with environmental laws here before. Most depend on the unique circumstances of the case and the fraudulent scheme in order to fit within one of the whistleblower programs. With the Trump Administration...

Photo of a Federal Court House and Post Office, representing Bipartisan Budget Act and to exemplify the debate in collected proceeds

FCPA Enforcement in 2017

The end of the Obama Administration was one of the busiest in the resolution of government investigations ever. The SEC and DOJ wrapped up nine Foreign Corrupt Practice Act investigations in the course of two months. The enforcement actions involved: Odebrecht and Braskem: $3.5 billion (US, Brazil and Switzerland) Rolls Royce: $800 million (US, UK...

100 Dollar Bills representing settlement and False Claims Act

False Claims Act Yields $519 Million for Whistleblowers in FY2016

False Claims Act Helps Recover $4.7 Billion The Justice Department announced the third highest annual recovery in the history of the False Claims Act yesterday – $4.7 billion for the federal government for fiscal year 2016 (ending Sept. 30th). Whistleblowers received awards of $519 million for their assistance recovering $2.9 billion – more than half...

Tag: mortgage fraud