The U.S. Department of Justice has announced the most recent statistics indicating the overwhelming success of the U.S. False Claims Act. Initially signed into law during the U.S. Civil War to address fraudulent government contractors, the False Claims Act has been strengthened over the years, most notably in 1987 by President Ronald Reagan. Since then, the U.S. Department of Justice has closely monitored the success of the False Claims Act and vigorously pursues cases in which the U.S. Government has been the victim of fraud. In 2007 alone, the False Claims Act recovered $3,029,249,933, which resulted in whistleblowers receiving $532,193,735 in awards. Some of the most common types of fraud which have been exposed and prosecuted using the False Claims Act are pharmaceutical fraud, healthcare fraud, defense contractor fraud, energy fraud, disaster relief fraud, and research fraud. Since the FCA was revised significantly in 1987, it recovered $30,315,593,792 to the U.S. Treasury and $3,418,672,503 was given to whistleblowers for awards due to their discovery of the fraud.
For more information see: http://www.justice.gov/civil/docs_forms/C-FRAUDS_FCA_Statistics.pdf
