KCI Wins Partial Dismissal of False Claims Act Case

Skadden won a motion to dismiss claims brought by a qui tam relator against Kinetic Concepts, Inc. under the federal False Claims Act. On April 27, Judge Beverly O’Connor of the U.S. District Court for the Central District of California ruled that the relator’s renewed fraud claims, which had been dismissed previously in December 2016, again failed to sufficiently allege that KCI submitted any false claims to Medicare or that it did so with the requisite scienter. Rather, the court found a “disconnect” between the facts pleaded and the relator’s assertion of fraud. The court further observed that the relator’s pleading established that “KCI management believed it was complying with all of Medicare’s requirements.”