One of the biggest changes brought about by the new bill is the reversal of the recent Supreme Court Decision in Allison Engine Co. v. United States. That decision created a loophole in which subcontractors receiving government money would not be liable under the False Claims Act, according to a statement released by the National Whistleblowers Center.

With the new legislation, a company can be charged under the FCA if an employee “knowingly makes a false claim to obtain money or property, any part of which is provided by the Government without regard to whether the wrongdoer deals directly with the Federal Government; with an agent acting on the Government’s behalf; or with a third party contractor, grantee, or other recipient of such money or property.”

Previously, government subcontractors could only be charged under the FCA if they knowingly and intentionally defrauded the government, not the primary contractor.

The bill was first introduced by Senators Patrick Leahy of Vermont and Chuck Grassley of Iowa in February.

If you’re so inclined, you can read the full text of the bill here. Of course, the simplest way to protect yourself and keep this all straight is…just don’t defraud anyone.

The ruling came after a complaint was filed with OSHA by an in-house attorney who worked for a publicly traded company (the attorney’s name and company seem to have been withheld). After the attorney learned that her company had sent misleading information to the SEC, she reported the information to the Board of Directors.

Her company hired a privately held, outside consulting firm to help reorganize. This is important because, after the attorney followed up on her report to the Board, she was fired by the outside company.

The attorney then sued both her company and the outside, privately-held firm that fired her, alleging that they both violated the whistle-blower provisions of Sarbanes-Oxley. An administrative law judge, as well as the DOL’s Administrative Review Board, ruled in her favor.

Valspar was tipped off to the theft after Lee allegedly resigned abruptly from his job two weeks after returning from a business trip in China. The company discovered suspicious activity on Lee’s laptop, such as recently deleted records as well as a hidden file that contained a number of unauthorized programs, according to the Minneapolis Business Journal.

According to the complaint against him, Lee accepted a job at Nippon Paint Co., one of Valspar’s competitors.

According to the online note, the hacker claimed to have stolen 8.3 million patients’ personal information in Virginia, deleted any back up files of the information and demanded $10 million for the information to be returned safely.

According to local Virginia news reports, as well as Wikileaks.org, an online site dedicated to publishing leaked documents, the hacker said, “I made an encrypted backup and deleted the original. Unfortunately for Virginia, their backups seem to have gone missing, too. Uhoh :( “ and said officials could reach him within seven days by emailing hackingforprofit@yahoo.com.

According to the DOJ, no individual at the Department of Energy had approved his annual performance award.

Of course, if you forge your own performance review in a private company you will probably get fired. If you do this while working for the federal government, you will receive criminal charges. The man faces a maximum penalty of a $250,000 fine and five years in prison.

Michelin and Total quickly denied the charges, according to a report by the UK’s Independent Newspaper. A spokesman for Total was quoted as saying, “All we have in Liechtenstein is two filling stations.”

While news of this action was “leaked” just days before the G20’s London Summit, many diplomatic sources were quoted in the story as saying that the move was a political move to help restore domestic confidence in President Sarkozy.

Most recently, SEC Commissioner Elisse Walter has announced that she is supportive of the concept. This comes after SEC Chairman Mary Schapiro has encouraged the concept as well.

Add to that the many, many reports of companies (with the main spotlight on financial services companies and the auto industry) disproportionately increasing executive compensation while stock prices slide downward, and you have the perfect storm for new regulations requiring say-on-pay measures.

Jeff Immelt of General Electric is the most recent of the latter bunch—Immelt recently waived a $12 million bonus. This isn’t the first time that Immelt has foregone bonuses amidst GE’s current, relative slump. As the Financial Times points out, in 2002 Immelt voluntarily entered into an equity-compensation plan based on performance-based goals of the company.

The $12 million that Immelt waived was part of this performance based pay.

Commentary: Another example of how GE does things right, beginning with a strong tone from the top. These days there are too many stories of banks such as AIG, Northern Trust and others lavishly spending money after accepting bailout dollars. It’s refreshing to hear stories such as this, and follow leaders such as Immelt that consistently set the right example for others.

Experts say that nearly two-thirds of all carbon emissions involved in the creation of its chocolate comes from the milk used in its product. In fact, a single cow reportedly has the same annual methane emissions as that of an average family car.

Cadbury is hoping to cut down on this number by encouraging its dairy farmer suppliers to change the dietary habits of the cattle that they raise. This, in turn, will change how bacteria in the cow’s stomach will break down the food and turn it into methane gas.

According to one study on the subject, dietary changes could reduce up to 50 percent emissions per year.

Prosecutors say that Foggo would accept tens of thousands of dollars worth of gifts from an old friend in exchange for ensuring that his friend would receive multimillion dollar government contracts.

He also reportedly attempted to get “his mistress hired by the CIA at a six-figure salary for a job for which she was unqualified,” according to a report by USA Today.

According to a news report by the Associated Press, Foggo had a long history of misconduct such as “when he punched a bicyclist during a traffic dispute while stationed overseas” in the late 1980’s and when “he breached security by engaging in multiple relationships with foreign women.”

According to Scott Murray, Nutrition Management’s Human Resources Director, Brown was not covered by the FMLA because she was a “brand new employee.” The jury disagreed, noting that Brown had worked in her position for two years before being hired on by Nutrition Management, and awarded her with $74,000 in back pay

After determining that the HR director had insufficient knowledge of the FMLA, judge Norma Shapiro added $6,600 to the fine and doubled the total amount to $161,311. She also tagged on over $145,000 in fees to Brown’s attorney, Eliot B. Platt.

Shapiro wrote in her decision, “Nutrition Management presented no evidence that it researched or had an attorney research the requirements of the FMLA, or was otherwise aware of the factors governing whether the FMLA would apply to Brown’s request for leave.”

The data was lost after the analyst’s home was robbed, but was later recovered by authorities. The analyst had taken the laptop home without clearance to do so.

The $20 million will be given in payments of $75 to $1,500 to veterans who can give clear evidence that they experienced emotional harm from the incident, or had expenses incurred from their stolen information.

If there is any money left over it will be donated to veterans-related charities.

The latest in a decade-old lawsuit, today’s ruling upheld the decision of a lower court that had to decide whether Taco Bell or TBWA was responsible for paying tens of millions of dollars in damages to Wrench, the ad firm that came up with the idea of “Psycho Chihuahua,” which later became the internationally-known Taco Bell Chihuahua.

A good description of the events leading up to the trial can be found in today’sappellate court’s decision. To sum it up, a licensing executive from Taco Bell approached Joseph Shields and Thomas Rinks, the founders of Wrench, after seeing the concept of Psycho Chihuahua at a trade show. He thought it would be a good fit for an upcoming Taco Bell ad campaign.

After price negotiations between Taco Bell and Wrench fell through, Taco Bell turned to their primary ad agency, TBWA, to create a mascot and theme for an upcoming $500 million ad campaign. Taco Bell gave TBWA materials related to Psycho Chihuahua to develop a similar idea for the campaign.

When Shields and Rinks saw the now famous “Yo Quiero Taco Bell” Chihuahua on TV in 1998, they quickly sued Taco Bell.

The two creators of Psycho Chihuahua won the suit and a $42 million judgment.

Taco Bell, after initially entering a “joint defense agreement” with TBWA, then sued the agency, asking for “full indemnification.” Because Taco Bell gave the Psycho Chihuahua materials to TBWA, the judge ruled that Taco Bell was fully liable for the $42 million in damages awarded to Wrench. Taco Bell appealed and lost again with today’s ruling.

Asked whether or not Taco Bell will appeal to a higher court, further dragging out this case, a company spokesperson said, “We just received the opinion today and are reviewing our options.”

It turns out that cartel and anti-trust violations may be rampant in the municipal bond world, made especially harmful due to the amount of notes and bonds that governments sell each year-about $400 billion worth. The issues surrounding Governor Richardson’s particular case could just be the tip of the iceberg.

According to The New York Times, at least three federal agencies and several attorneys general have been working for years to uncover collusion among independent specialists hired by municipalities to distribute bond packages. According to the Times, one of these specialists was recorded during a phone conversation saying, “We want you to bid on this deal, but you’re not going to get it — you’re going to get the next one. We want you to submit a sloppy bid.”

Municipalities would then obliviously pay the vendor that the specialist recommended, often at inflated prices. Combined with the minuscule regulation in municipal bonds, this activity has been able to safely occur for some time.

Despite this shocking news, it does look like there might be light at the end of the tunnel. In a related story, President Obama made his first public act in office today to enact new, stringent laws on lobbying. Perhaps this ethics-in-contracting mindset will trickle down to the smaller, municipal level in order to stop antitrust in bond markets from escalating ever further.

Today’s financial crisis allows the opportunity for many research based organizations to publish studies on just that. One such study, conducted by Transparency International in January, discovered that as the economy sinks, the amount of corruption in the business world goes up.

As Jermyn Brooks, a Director at TI, put it, “For the business world, when the economic parameters get tight there is a much stronger temptation to focus on survival … regardless of what that means in terms of perhaps cutting corners.”

He suggests that business leaders are more concerned about job cuts than preventing bribes in time like this. So what should companies to do? Ensure that you have up-to-date compliance and anti-corruption systems, Brooks says.

If there is a lesson to be learned from the recession we find ourselves in, it’s that now, more than ever, companies need to focus on their compliance systems and reinforce ethical culture, rather than shy away from them for budgetary reasons.

Schwarzman, CEO of asset management firm Blackstone Group, was referring to charges that the SEC brought against 33-year-old Managing Director Ramesh Chakrapani who is based out of the company’s London offices. Chakrapani is accused of handing out privileged information regarding the 2006 takeover of Albertson’s, a national supermarket retailer that hired Blackstone’s M&A team to oversee the transaction.

Chakrapani, who was a vice president at the time and worked on the Albertson’s takeover, allegedly sent at least 20 calls and 18 text messages to a friend. The friend, an unnamed financial analyst, used the info to profit to the tune of $3.6 million.

Chakrapani has been suspended, according to Schwarzman’s company-wide letter. Now he’s awaiting trial set for next Tuesday, according to CNN. Bail is set at $300,000, but he has some room to move around as his travel was restricted to New York City and … California.

Whole Foods, and Mackey, are taking two contradictory paths in trying to gather the information. The first was by seeking subpoenas targeted at the 96 companies. Late last year that path caused a huge PR fallout in Portland, Oregon (but didn’t stop the motion for subpoenas), so this week Mackey decided to personally appeal to the CEOs of the various companies by sending them a letter.

This tactic is even more gutsy due to the nature of the information that Whole Foods is requesting. New Seasons, a Portland, Oregon-based natural foods retailer subpoenaed by Whole Foods, said it was asked to hand over two year’s worth of sales figures, future expansion plans and any internal communication regarding the Whole Foods/Wild Oats merger.

While Whole Foods says the info will only be going to their outside counsel, many involved are skeptical. Brian Rohter, CEO of New Seasons, may have put it best when he said, “That’s like trusting the fox to guard the henhouse – and we don’t have any faith it’s going to work like that. I’m sorry to say this, but some of the people at Whole Foods have a history of less than stellar behavior when it comes to competing fairly.”

Of course, he’s most likely referring to Mackey’s posing as an anonymous Internet user with the name ‘Rahodeb,’ posting over 1,200 comments on Yahoo! Finance message boards about Whole Foods in 2007.

The trial over the Whole Foods/Wild Oats merger is set for April, but in the meantime you can get your fix on news coverage of this story (from an insider’s perspective) by heading over to the New Seasons Market blog.

In January, the Guidelines Monitoring Group (GMG), the group established to verify compliance with the code, released its first report and the results were less than impressive.

The report states “almost all of the firms” complied with many of the guidelines/requirements, though the method in which the firms “complied” varied drastically. Overall, the report claimed that fewer than 50 percent of the firms which voluntarily signed onto the Code complied with 100 percent of the guidelines.

A portion of the money comes from Siemens Bangladesh, which admitted in December 2008 that it paid over $5 million in bribes to Bangladeshi officials over the period of May 2001 to August 2006. In return for the bribes, Siemens asked for favorable treatment during the bidding process of a mobile telephone project, according to a press release from the DOJ. Most of the money reportedly went to the former prime minister of Bangladesh’s son, Arafat “Koko” Rahman.

This story emphasizes how the Department of Justice continues to expand the international applications of the FCPA. This action certainly tops the punishment that the former French Alcatel executive received last year when the DOJ found that he was in violation of the FCPA after bribing authorities in Costa Rica. This is a good way to keep international companies on their toes as international law slowly works on catching up with the FCPA. Simply put, if you want to compete internationally, don’t bribe.

In 2000 Markopolis was a former employee of a rival firm to Madoff’s, and later in 2004 began his own fraud investigation practice. Markopolis (and a few of his friends) spent eight years trying to figure out how Madoff was illegally generating 12% returns for his investors amidst a terrible market. They went so far as to say they made a hobby out of trying to figure out Madoff’s secret.

From the article:

“Some people play fantasy sports, that was how it was with us — Madoff was our fantasy sport,” Mr. Markopolos recalls. “We wanted him nailed.”

According to the article, the SEC determined that “Mr. Madoff personally ‘misled the examination staff about the nature of the strategy’ used by the Fairfield funds and other hedge-fund accounts, and also ‘withheld from the examination staff information about certain of these customers’ accounts.’”

The article continues:

The staff recommended closing the investigation because Mr. Madoff agreed to register his investment-advisory business and Fairfield agreed to disclose information about Mr. Madoff to investors. The SEC report said the staff closed the case “because those violations were not so serious as to warrant an enforcement action.”

Back then Madoff only managed around $10 billion. Too bad he wasn’t discovered until his portfolio reached five times that size…

Take a look at the WSJ’s story, which also includes a number of documents Markopolos sent to the SEC over the past few years.

On Friday, a new mandatory disclosure rule took effect that dramatically alters the legal dynamic between government contractors and federal agencies. Specifically, an amendment to the Federal Acquisition Regulation (“FAR”) became operational that henceforth requires all contractors to “timely” disclose certain violations of law and overpayments to the government on penalty of suspension and debarment.

The new disclosure requirement applies not only to prospective violations, but also to violations known to a contractor “principal” as of the effective date of the rule (i.e., December 12, 2008). Also in effect as of Friday are new minimum standards for internal control systems intended to preclude violations by contractors.

For further descriptions and detail of the new rule, take a look at this Client Advisory, prepared by Kelley Drye’s Government Contracts Practice. It also provides recommendations for contractors to help ensure that they remain in compliance.

The most common problems associated with Ortho Evra, Bloomberg notes, are:

According to the story:

J&J’s annual report cited “a significant decline” in Ortho Evra sales because of “labeling changes and negative media coverage concerning product safety.”

Worth noting, J&J has never actually gone to trial over Ortho Evra:

“Their exposure was pretty high, so they were willing to talk turkey about settling,” [one of the plaintiff's attorneys Russell] Rein said. “They have been settling out quite a few cases where the damages are significant and the causation is clear.”

Some groups, such as Public Citizen’s Health Research Group, question why the patch is still on the market and have petitioned the FDA to ban it within six months.

J&J disagrees, as Gloria Vanderham, a spokeswoman for J&J, says, “When used according to the FDA-approved label, Ortho Evra is a safe and effective method of hormonal birth control.”

WPP alleged that Benatti secretly took for his personal gain the majority of the proceeds from a £17 million takeover of an Italian advertising company. Benatti fired back, alleging that he was dismissed improperly. He claimed that he was let go because he “had fallen out” with the company’s COO in Italy, Daniela Weber, who was allegedly involved in a relationship with company chief executive, Sir Martin Sorrell (pictured). According to the story, after a five-day hearing, Benatti and WPP have reached a confidential settlement, thus ending the case.

Last year Sorrell also filed a libel suit against Benatti after Benatti allegedly distributed “a computer-generated image showing [Sorrell] with Ms Weber labeled ‘the mad dwarf and the nympho schizo.’” In that case, Benatti paid £120,000 to Sorrell, but didn’t admit liability.

Two police officers who allegedly gave information to the journalists are also going on trial for “deliberately revealing state secrets,” according to an AP report on the story.

The Economist has a good description of the corruption that the reporters uncovered, saying the “case was a scandal at the transport ministry in 2006 in which newspapers revealed how officials had gambled around $750,000 of public money on the outcomes of football matches. In the clean-up that followed, the head of a road-building department at the ministry was jailed, along with seven others.”

In a related story, The China Post reports that seven journalists had their press cards taken away in retaliation for covering the corruption story.

Media watchdog groups rightly argue for the release of the two journalists, arguing that jail time will discourage other would-be whistle-blowers and investigative journalists from reporting on government crimes.

The trial could last two days according to a court official, and the charge of “abusing freedom and democracy” has a maximum sentence of seven years in jail.

The wax cartel has been operating since 1992, meeting in “top hotels” across Europe between then and 2005. Neelie Kroes, the EU Competition Commissioner, said, “There is probably not a household or company in Europe that has not bought products affected by this ‘paraffin mafia’ cartel, with all that implies in terms of paying over the odds, higher costs and economic damage.”

Of the nine companies involved in the fine, South Africa’s Sasol was burdened with the largest percentage, nearly 50 percent, because the EC deemed it the ringleader. The next largest fine, €128.1 million, was slapped on France’s Total. ExxonMobil landed third place with €83.6 million. The rest was divvied up between Spain’s Repsol; Italy’s Eni; Germany’s Tuda-petrol, Hansen & Rosenthal and RWE; and Hungary’s MOL.

Shell was given immunity because it blew the whistle on the group, avoiding a potential fine of €96 million.

Sasol said if it found grounds to appeal the fine, it would. Apparently the company feels it has enough information to do so, as CEO Pat Davies said, “As we see things now, we intend to appeal.” However, appealing may not be enough to rid the companies of any and all financial damage, as the EC encouraged individuals or companies who were victims of the cartel to seek damages as well.