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False Claim Need Not Be "Presented" By Defendant

Client Alert | 1 min read | 12.20.05

In the latest in a series of cases interpreting the False Claims Act's "presentment" element, the court in U.S. v. Sequel Contractors, Inc., 2005 WL 3307026 (C.D. Cal., Nov. 14, 2005), held that a contractor submitting a false claim for payment to its county-government customer, which then submitted a request for partial reimbursement to the federal government, could be liable under the FCA, because the statute only requires that someone (in this case the county-government customer), and not necessarily the defendant itself, "present" the false claim to the federal government, as long as the defendant "causes" the ultimate presentation. The court also held that, although actionable false claims must be made "knowingly," the knowledge in question is knowledge of the claim's falsity, not knowledge that the ultimate recipient of the claim would be the federal government.

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Client Alert | 3 min read | 05.28.26

PFAS Regulatory Alert: EPA Rolls Back RCRA Proposed Rule on “Hazardous Waste” but Does Not Disturb Proposed RCRA Rule on PFAS

Earlier this month, the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) withdrew a February 2024 Biden administration proposed rule, “Definition of Hazardous Waste Applicable to Corrective Action for Releases From Solid Waste Management Units,” under the Resource Conservation and Recovery Act (RCRA).[1] The withdrawn proposal would have revised RCRA corrective action regulations to expressly apply the broader statutory definition of “hazardous waste,” rather than only the narrower regulatory definition. Now, EPA is maintaining the status quo for corrective action under RCRA. However, EPA’s withdrawal of its proposed RCRA hazardous waste definition makes no mention of its corresponding proposal from 2024 to list nine per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances (PFAS) as RCRA hazardous constituents.[2] This disjointed withdrawal, while providing some certainty for regulated entities, does not resolve how EPA plans to address PFAS under the RCRA program....