Value of Services Performed Must Be Considered in Fraud Case

On April 28, the Fifth Circuit found in U.S. v. Harris that the government must take into account the value of the work performed in assessing damages in procurement fraud cases, even when sentencing individuals. In a perhaps unique fact pattern, the court upheld the conviction for 16 counts of wire fraud, but overturned the two-year prison sentence of an Army colonel because the government had calculated damages based on the full $1.3 million value of the contracts, rather than properly reducing that total for the value of the work performed.