Dish License Fraud Appeal Focuses on FCC Knowledge, Penalties

D.C. Circuit judges wanted to know Thursday why a whistleblower suit against Dish Network Corp. alleging a scheme to improperly win spectrum licenses at an FCC auction should be revived if the commission already looked into the claims.

Whistleblower Vermont National Telephone Co. said a district court improperly dismissed the suit under the False Claims Act’s government-disclosure bar, which precludes suits “based upon allegations or transactions which are the subject of a civil suit or an administrative civil money penalty proceeding in which the government is already a party.”

Counsel for Vermont National, Jeffrey Lamken of MoloLamken LLP, told the ...