Government Contracts

  • October 03, 2024

    High Court Told Bid-Rigging Conviction Was Rightly Tossed

    A former Contech executive is urging the U.S. Supreme Court to reject the government's effort to revive his bid-rigging conviction, saying enforcers are asking for a rule that would make common agreements between manufacturers and distributors vulnerable to legal challenge.

  • October 03, 2024

    Flint Water Judge Wishes Public Knew Case Complexity

    A Michigan federal judge on Thursday gave the final approval to a $25 million settlement to end claims from a class of Flint adults and businesses accusing a firm of failing to properly alert officials about the dangers of the city's water, noting that the case took years to resolve because it involved complicated legal issues.

  • October 03, 2024

    NJ Contractors Accused Of $10M Fraud In Lead Removal Work

    A New Jersey construction company billed the city of Newark $10.2 million for replacing 1,500 lead water service lines but never did the work, instead concocting false evidence to show new copper pipes had been installed, federal authorities said Thursday in announcing the arrests of the chief executive and a foreperson.

  • October 03, 2024

    Md. Woman Gets House Arrest For No-Show Contractor Job

    A Maryland woman will spend six months on home confinement for accepting nearly $500,000 in salary for a no-show job arranged by her boyfriend, a U.S. Army contracting officer, a Massachusetts federal judge has ordered.

  • October 03, 2024

    Sens. Question If Payouts Taint Execs' Push For US Steel Deal

    Two U.S. senators wrote to U.S. Steel's president and CEO on Wednesday seeking guarantees that a $72 million "golden parachute" deal wasn't driving the executive's willingness to support a $14.1 billion merger with Japanese steelmaker Nippon Steel.

  • October 03, 2024

    NJ Mogul's Brother Says Lawyering Isn't Racketeering

    Parker McCay PA shareholder Philip A. Norcross is urging a New Jersey state judge to toss the sweeping indictment against him, his power broker brother and others over an alleged extortion scheme to acquire riverfront property in a distressed city, arguing that none of the targeted conduct is criminal.

  • October 03, 2024

    White House Directs Agencies On Responsible AI Acquisition

    The White House has issued guidance to agencies on responsible purchases of artificial intelligence, addressing issues such as mitigating associated privacy and performance risks, ensuring the market for AI remains competitive, and enabling related collaboration across the government.

  • October 03, 2024

    Energy Dept. Awards $1.5B For 4 Power Line Projects

    The U.S. Department of Energy on Thursday handed out $1.5 billion in Congressional funding for a quartet of long-distance transmission projects, as well as a study that calls for a massive expansion of the U.S. electric grid over the next 25 years.

  • October 02, 2024

    ​​​​​​​Lab Co. Settles Bogus Testing Claims With Feds For $27M

    Precision Diagnostics Toxicology Lab, one of the nation's largest drug testing laboratories, has agreed to pay $27 million to resolve allegations that it billed Medicare and other federal healthcare programs for medically unnecessary tests, federal prosecutors announced Wednesday.

  • October 02, 2024

    Gov't Tells Justices That E-Rate Program Is Covered By FCA

    The federal government is urging the U.S. Supreme Court to declare that E-Rate reimbursement fraud is covered by the False Claims Act because the government provides the program's funding.

  • October 02, 2024

    Fla. Court Says Superintendent Must Face Perjury Charge

    A Florida appeals court Wednesday reinstated an indictment accusing a school superintendent of lying to a statewide grand jury convened in response to the 2018 mass shooting at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School.

  • October 02, 2024

    Madigan Can't Duck Bribery Claims After High Court Ruling

    An Illinois federal judge on Wednesday declined to dismiss bribery charges against former Illinois House Speaker Michael Madigan after the U.S. Supreme Court's ruling limiting the reach of a bribery statute that once criminalized gratuities, while also refusing to sever his case from his co-defendant's.

  • October 02, 2024

    Quinn Emanuel Can't Ignore Past Oro Negro Ties, Oil Co. Says

    Oro Negro Drilling Pte. Ltd. said former counsel Quinn Emanuel Urquhart & Sullivan LLP must produce confidential information in a discovery bid to disqualify its attorneys in Mexican proceedings.

  • October 02, 2024

    Tenn. Atty Sues Federal Court, Judges Over Gag Order Rule

    A rule of the U.S. District Court for the Middle District of Tennessee barring attorneys from making "any extrajudicial statements" about cases pending in the district violates the First Amendment and should be blocked, according to a Nashville civil rights lawyer.

  • October 02, 2024

    Bid-Rig Charges Irrelevant To $26M Base Award, GAO Says

    The U.S. Government Accountability Office has shot down a contractor's protest over a rival company being awarded a $26 million Army hospital maintenance contract, finding that the awardee's conviction for bid-rigging in Korea had no bearing on its track record of successful operations.

  • October 01, 2024

    Bribe-Laundering Gets Ecuador Ex-Official 10 Years In Prison

    A Florida federal judge on Tuesday sentenced Ecuador's former comptroller to 10 years in prison after a jury earlier this year convicted him on multiple counts related to laundering millions of dollars in bribe money he received in exchange for eliminating fines connected to a defective hydroelectric dam and other projects.

  • October 01, 2024

    Data Brokers Decry 'Ill-Tailored' NJ Judicial Privacy Law

    Data brokers such as Equifax, Thomson Reuters and Zillow urged a New Jersey federal judge Tuesday to toss a suit accusing them of violating Daniel's Law, arguing the state's judicial privacy measure is unconstitutionally broad and unevenly applied. 

  • October 01, 2024

    Novel FCA Decision Amplifies Voices Of Whistleblower Critics

    A Florida federal judge's characterization of whistleblowers as self-appointed "special prosecutors" when they file lawsuits on the federal government's behalf amplifies the voices of critics questioning the constitutionality of a key enforcement tool for fighting fraud, while threatening to create a circuit split.

  • October 01, 2024

    Water Firm Can't End Flint Children's Negligence Claims

    The federal judge presiding over Flint, Michigan, water crisis litigation again ruled on Tuesday that an engineering firm won't be able to avoid professional negligence claims related to its consulting work with the city, issuing the 70-page opinion days before jury selection for a bellwether trial begins.

  • October 01, 2024

    Military Contractor's Widow Can Continue Death Benefit Suit

    A widow's pursuit of $670,000 in benefits following her husband's death in Afghanistan while training the country's police force can continue, an Illinois federal judge ruled, trimming claims against the man's employers and benefits administrators but leaving her breach of contract claim against an insurer intact.

  • October 01, 2024

    Steward Can't Be Forced To Reassign Contract In Ch. 11

    While a government contractor was within its rights to end a subcontracting agreement with embattled hospital group Steward Health, the Bankruptcy Code's provisions for assignment of contracts mean the debtor can't be compelled to reassign the agreement while in Chapter 11, a Texas bankruptcy judge said Tuesday.

  • October 01, 2024

    Big Banks Urge Panel To Toss NJ Bond Marketing Claims

    A New Jersey state judge erred when he applied a recent change in state law to deny a bid by JPMorgan Chase & Co. and other big banks to toss a suit accusing them of a scheme to inflate the interest rates of certain bonds, the banks argued Tuesday before a state appellate panel.

  • October 01, 2024

    Mass. Hospital To Pay Up To $6.5M In Sober Home Scheme

    A Massachusetts behavioral health hospital will pay up to $6.5 million to resolve claims it illegally steered Medicare and Medicaid patients to its outpatient substance abuse programs with a promise of free sober home housing, according to a settlement announced Tuesday.

  • October 01, 2024

    Nostrum Labs Hits Ch. 11 A Year After Medicaid Settlement

    Nostrum Laboratories, a New Jersey drugmaker that paid millions to settle allegations that it underpaid Medicaid drug rebates for its bladder infection drug after it hiked the price more than 400%, filed for Chapter 11 protection with nearly $68.3 million in debt.

  • October 01, 2024

    'Unsworn' Actors Sink Qui Tam Provision, Fla. Judge Rules

    A Florida federal judge on Monday ruled that the provision of the False Claims Act allowing whistleblowers to bring suits on behalf of the federal government is unconstitutional, dismissing a closely watched Medicare Advantage fraud case and potentially upending a key federal enforcement tool.

Expert Analysis

  • Electrifying Transportation With Public-Private Partnerships

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    Many clean energy goals remain public policy abstractions that face a challenging road to realization — but public-private partnership models could be a valuable tool to electrify the transportation sector, says Michael Blackwell at Husch Blackwell.

  • In Memoriam: The Modern Administrative State

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    On June 28, the modern administrative state, where courts deferred to agency interpretations of ambiguous statutes, died when the U.S. Supreme Court overruled its previous decision in Chevron v. Natural Resources Defense Council — but it is survived by many cases decided under the Chevron framework, say Joseph Schaeffer and Jessica Deyoe at Babst Calland.

  • How High Court Approached Time Limit On Reg Challenges

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    The U.S. Supreme Court's decision in Corner Post v. Federal Reserve Board effectively gives new entities their own personal statute of limitations to challenge rules and regulations, and Justice Brett Kavanaugh's concurrence may portend the court's view that those entities do not need to be directly regulated, say attorneys at Snell & Wilmer.

  • Expect The Unexpected: Contracts For Underground Projects

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    Recent challenges encountered by the Mountain Valley Pipeline project underscore the importance of drafting contracts for underground construction to account for unexpected site conditions, associated risks and compliance with applicable laws, say Jill Jaffe and Brenda Lin at Nossaman.

  • How To Clean Up Your Generative AI-Produced Legal Drafts

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    As law firms increasingly rely on generative artificial intelligence tools to produce legal text, attorneys should be on guard for the overuse of cohesive devices in initial drafts, and consider a few editing pointers to clean up AI’s repetitive and choppy outputs, says Ivy Grey at WordRake.

  • Series

    Boxing Makes Me A Better Lawyer

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    Boxing has influenced my legal work by enabling me to confidently hone the skills I've learned from the sport, like the ability to remain calm under pressure, evaluate an opponent's weaknesses and recognize when to seize an important opportunity, says Kirsten Soto at Clyde & Co.

  • Fed. Circ. Percipient Gov't Contract Ruling Is Groundbreaking

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    The effects of the Federal Circuit's decision last month in Percipient.ai v. U.S. may be limited to commercial product and service suppliers, but it is significant for government procurement in opening the door to protests by suppliers who previously would have lacked standing and Court of Federal Claims jurisdiction, say attorneys at Haynes Boone.

  • Opinion

    Industry Self-Regulation Will Shine Post-Chevron

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    The U.S. Supreme Court's Loper decision will shape the contours of industry self-regulation in the years to come, providing opportunities for this often-misunderstood practice, says Eric Reicin at BBB National Programs.

  • Justices' Bribery Ruling: A Corrupt Act Isn't Necessarily Illegal

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    In its Snyder v. U.S. decision last week, the U.S. Supreme Court held that a bribery law does not criminalize gratuities, continuing a trend of narrowing federal anti-corruption laws and scrutinizing public corruption prosecutions that go beyond obvious quid pro quo schemes, say Carrie Cohen and Christine Wong at MoFo.

  • 3 Ways Agencies Will Keep Making Law After Chevron

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    The U.S. Supreme Court clearly thinks it has done something big in overturning the Chevron precedent that had given deference to agencies' statutory interpretations, but regulated parties have to consider how agencies retain significant power to shape the law and its meaning, say attorneys at K&L Gates.

  • Roundup

    After Chevron

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    Since the U.S. Supreme Court overturned the Chevron deference standard in June, this Expert Analysis series has featured attorneys discussing the potential impact across 36 different rulemaking and litigation areas.

  • Opinion

    Atty Well-Being Efforts Ignore Root Causes Of The Problem

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    The legal industry is engaged in a critical conversation about lawyers' mental health, but current attorney well-being programs primarily focus on helping lawyers cope with the stress of excessive workloads, instead of examining whether this work culture is even fundamentally compatible with lawyer well-being, says Jonathan Baum at Avenir Guild.

  • Contract Disputes Recap: Addressing Dispositive Motions

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    Stephanie Magnell and Bret Marfut at Seyfarth examine three recent decisions from the U.S. Court of Claims and the U.S. Civilian Board of Contract Appeals that provide interesting takeaways about the nuances of motion practice utilized by the government to dispose of cases brought under the Contract Disputes Act prior to substantive litigation

  • Series

    Skiing And Surfing Make Me A Better Lawyer

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    The skills I’ve learned while riding waves in the ocean and slopes in the mountains have translated to my legal career — developing strong mentor relationships, remaining calm in difficult situations, and being prepared and able to move to a backup plan when needed, says Brian Claassen at Knobbe Martens.

  • Unpacking The Circuit Split Over A Federal Atty Fee Rule

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    Federal circuit courts that have addressed Rule 41(d) of the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure are split as to whether attorney fees are included as part of the costs of a previously dismissed action, so practitioners aiming to recover or avoid fees should tailor arguments to the appropriate court, says Joseph Myles and Lionel Lavenue at Finnegan.

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