HCA Fights Revival of Kickback Suit Over Office Building Deals

HCA Healthcare Inc. is fighting a whistleblower’s attempt to revive kickback claims against the hospital company after a federal court blocked his use of facts learned during discovery to amend his complaint.

The case highlights a divide in how whistleblowers and hospital defense counsel view the requirements for pleading a False Claims Act case—how much a whistleblower has to know and at what stage of the case. In this case, now on appeal, a federal judge blocked the claims of a whistleblower whose evidence derived from his analysis of public records, as he perhaps tried to replicate a previous successful ...