In my most recent post on the three Katrina qui tam cases, I compared Allstate to Larry, the character on the old Newhart show who spoke for his two mute brothers – “my brother Darryl and my other brother Darryl”. This update on the Branch Consultants’ qui tam case is the first of three follow-up posts, each focusing on a single case. While Louisiana federal district Judge Sarah Vance is not only more attractive than Larry’s “other brother Darryl”, pictured center in photo on the right, one might think she, too, mute given Allstate’s attempt to put words in her mouth.
Allstate certainly has good reason to be concerned. The Company has the distinction of being a named defendant in all the Katrina qui tam cases. Allstate argues it is a distinction without a difference and that, on that basis, Judge Vance lacks jurisdiction under the “first to file” requirement of the FCA (False Claims Act). A related SLABBED post, Allstate files Answer in Branch – and this I couldn’t make up!, introduced Allstate’s position; i.e., the Rigsby sisters were the first to file.
Despite having once invited Branch counsel Allen Kanner to “kiss my***ex rel“, I do not believe Judge Vance can determine jurisdiction until discovery has been completed in Branch, the recently unsealed ex rel Denenea v Allstate and Rigsby with the scope of expanded. Allstate represents the FCA restriction on similar claims too narrowly, IMO, but more importantly, there is currently no way to know for certain.
My position, however, is contrary to the strategy of the “wool-over-court’s-eye” scheme concocted, or so I believe, by Allstate and other insurers as an element in the overall scheme of fraudulent claims handling that followed Hurricane Katrina – and it is the context of that wet-dog smelling scheme unraveling before Judge Vance that we examined the current status of the Branch Consultants’ qui tam case.
If you knit, you know that a dropped stitch can’t be covered. Magistrate Shushan’s recent Orders make it clear that dropping a stitch in a “wool-over-court’s-eye” scheme also can’t be covered. Continue reading “Surely Allstate doesn’t think Judge Sarah Vance is the “other brother Darryl” – “good hands” trying to put words in her mouth (a Branch qui tam updaate)”