U.S. Attorney's Office for the District of Northern West Virginia issued the following announcement on Feb. 14.
U.S. Attorney Bill Powell announced today that the Northern District of West Virginia collected $1,815,859 in criminal and civil actions in Fiscal Year 2018. Of this amount, $654,180 was collected in criminal actions and $1,161,679 was collected in civil actions.
As a whole, the Justice Department collected nearly $15 billion in civil and criminal actions in the fiscal year ending Sept. 30, 2018. The $14,839,821,650 in collections in FY 2018 represents is nearly seven times the appropriated $2.13 billion ($2,136,750,000) budget for the 94 U.S. Attorneys’ offices.
“The men and women of the U.S. Attorneys’ offices across the country work diligently, day in and day out, to see that the citizens of our nation receive justice. The money that we are able to recover for victims and this country as a whole is a direct result of their hard work,” Director James A. Crowell, IV, Executive Office for U.S. Attorneys.
“In addition to our responsibility to protect the public, we have the additional responsibility to recoup, to the extent possible, money improperly taken from victims of criminal or civil wrongdoing, whether the victim is an individual, business, or taxpayer. We take these responsibilities seriously and will continue to do so in coordination with our law enforcement and agency partners,” said Powell.
In 2018, the Northern District of West Virginia recovered $1,091,348 as part of the settlement in the case against several physicians and a kickback scheme. Four doctors agreed to pay back their respective sums after they were accused of participating in a kickback scheme with Southwest Laboratories, Medscan Laboratory, sales representatives affiliated with Southwest and Medscan and others, thereby causing false claims to be submitted to Medicare in violation of the Federal False Claims Act, the Physician Self-Referral law, and the Anti-Kickback Statute. An additional physician paid $650,000 as a part of the case in Fiscal Year 2019.
The U.S. Attorneys’ Offices, along with the department’s litigating divisions, are responsible for enforcing and collecting civil and criminal debts owed to the U.S. and criminal debts owed to federal crime victims. The law requires defendants to pay restitution to victims of certain federal crimes who have suffered a physical injury or financial loss. While restitution is paid to the victim, criminal fines and felony assessments are paid to the department’s Crime Victims Fund, which distributes the funds collected to federal and state victim compensation and victim assistance programs.
The largest civil collections were from affirmative civil enforcement cases, in which the United States recovered government money lost to fraud or other misconduct or collected fines imposed on individuals and/or corporations for violations of federal health, safety, civil rights or environmental laws. In addition, civil debts were collected on behalf of several federal agencies, including the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development, the Department of Health and Human Services, the Internal Revenue Service, the Small Business Administration and the Department of Education.
Original source can be found here.
