United States Supreme Court

In a qui tam action under the False Claims Act (FCA), alleging that defense contractors and related entities had fraudulently billed the Government for water purification services that were not performed or not performed properly, the Fourth Circuit's judgment that the Wartime Suspension of Limitations Act (WSLA), which suspends the running of any statute of limitations applicable to any offense involving fraud against the Federal Government, applied to civil claims and that the first-to-file bar ceases to apply once a related action is dismissed, is: 1) reversed in part where the WSLA applies only to criminal offenses, not to civil claims like those in this case; and 2) affirmed in part where the FCA's first-to-file bar keeps new claims out of court only while related claims are still alive, not in perpetuity, and thus, dismissal with prejudice was not called for in this case.

Appellate Information

• Decided 05/26/2015
• Published 05/26/2015

Judges

• Alito

Court

• United States Supreme Court

Counsel