Maryland False Claims Act Update
Posted by Zachary Kitts at 2/15/2008 9:26 AM and is filed under uncategorized 
Maryland appears to be making progress on passing its own false claims act. Senate Bill 0845—which is cross-filed with House Bill 292—had its first reading this week.
Fortunately, the current version of the legislation is a true false claims act, in that it creates liability for any false call on the public fisc. This is a big improvement over the prior version, which would have penalized only false claims against Medicaid.
The proposed Maryland False Claims Act would appear to comply to the Deficit Reduction Act of 2005, thus qualifying Maryland for an additional 10% of all Medicaid recoveries.
Anyone who has filed a Medicare qui tam case in the U.S. District Court for the District of Maryland knows the misery of not being able to file a pendent state claim under a comparable Maryland statute. Hopefully the days of such filings are nearing an end.
ZAK zkitts@cookkitts.com
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