Qui Tam is a very interesting niche practice in the law. The Qui Tam provisions start in the 1800s during the Civil War. President Abraham Lincoln was getting his Army requisitions were getting ripped off and he was buying things that were not coming through once he bought them. So, for instance the Union Army would pay for rifles and instead of getting a thousand rifles, they would get one hundred rifles and they wouldn't work. So, they wanted to figure out a way of making sure that what they were purchasing they were getting the value for what they were trying to buy. They created a reward system and Qui Tam is short for a Latin Phrase means "He who sues on behalf of the King, sues for himself as well." In other words, If you, as someone who knows that this deal is going through, and also knows that the person doing business with the Government is going to rip off the Government, if you turn them in, commonly called a "whistleblower" or if you whistle blow on them, that you will be included in the part of the savings or rewards or recovery that the Government gains in that transaction.
So, in today's environment, fraud schemes are incredibly complex. But here is a very simple example. Corporation "A" makes a deal with the Government to sell them a million paperclips a month. That works for a couple of months, but corporation "A" realizes that no one on the Government's end is trying to count the paperclips or do anything to make sure they are getting their million dollars worth of paperclips. Instead they decide, "You know what? We're going to send them nine hundred thousand paperclips a month." Since no one is counting, they are getting away with 10% of the deal. Then they do eight hundred thousand and that works for five years. Now five years goes by of ripping off the Government twenty percent on that contract until somebody in the company finds out and when they do and they look back and realize that millions of dollars of purchased paperclips have never been sent to the Government, they can tell the Government about that and when the Government recovers they can recover with the Government.
Unfortunately it doesn't happen easily. Number one, the schemes are very complex. So, you need paperwork, documentation, etc. Number two, the Government is very apt to listen to you and then in the end if you are not properly secured in your claim the Government may not allow you to keep that claim and will not give you your fifteen to thirty percent of the money. So, people need an attorney to represent them in going to the Government and the people they should hire for that job are people with Governmental prosecutorial experience. You would want someone who understands how the Government works. I'm a passed prosecutor of the Justice Department, my wife is a passed prosecutor of the State Attorney's office and we all have the experience to bring those claims to the prosecutor in a format they understand in a significant organized fashion so that the person who gives them the claim, the professional name for that is a "relator", the relator secures their claim so that they can recover in the end . It's a long and arduous process. It can be risky for the relator. They have to be willing to go out and do these things. Usually if they have a really valid claim it can be extremely lucrative.
So, in today's environment, fraud schemes are incredibly complex. But here is a very simple example. Corporation "A" makes a deal with the Government to sell them a million paperclips a month. That works for a couple of months, but corporation "A" realizes that no one on the Government's end is trying to count the paperclips or do anything to make sure they are getting their million dollars worth of paperclips. Instead they decide, "You know what? We're going to send them nine hundred thousand paperclips a month." Since no one is counting, they are getting away with 10% of the deal. Then they do eight hundred thousand and that works for five years. Now five years goes by of ripping off the Government twenty percent on that contract until somebody in the company finds out and when they do and they look back and realize that millions of dollars of purchased paperclips have never been sent to the Government, they can tell the Government about that and when the Government recovers they can recover with the Government.
Unfortunately it doesn't happen easily. Number one, the schemes are very complex. So, you need paperwork, documentation, etc. Number two, the Government is very apt to listen to you and then in the end if you are not properly secured in your claim the Government may not allow you to keep that claim and will not give you your fifteen to thirty percent of the money. So, people need an attorney to represent them in going to the Government and the people they should hire for that job are people with Governmental prosecutorial experience. You would want someone who understands how the Government works. I'm a passed prosecutor of the Justice Department, my wife is a passed prosecutor of the State Attorney's office and we all have the experience to bring those claims to the prosecutor in a format they understand in a significant organized fashion so that the person who gives them the claim, the professional name for that is a "relator", the relator secures their claim so that they can recover in the end . It's a long and arduous process. It can be risky for the relator. They have to be willing to go out and do these things. Usually if they have a really valid claim it can be extremely lucrative.