A federal judge last week rejected a request to dismiss a February 2019 fraud lawsuit against a former contractor and subcontractor for the Department of Energy’s never-completed plutonium recycling plant at the Savannah River Site in South Carolina.
Project prime MOX Services and subcontractor Wise Services failed to explain why the case should be thrown out, Judge Terry L. Wooten, of U.S. District Court in South Carolina, wrote in denying the motion for dismissal.
In a February 2019 lawsuit, the Department of Justice alleged MOX Services and Wise Services conspired to file $6.4 million worth of fraudulent claims while working on the Mixed Oxide Fuel Fabrication Facility (MFFF) at the 310-square-mile DOE facility near Aiken, S.C. Wise Services had been providing construction labor services for the project since 2008, a year after MOX Services broke ground.
The federal government says the companies violated the Anti-Kickback Act, a federal statute that prohibits the exchange of valuables for services.
In the complaint, the Justice Department said MOX Services was aware that, from 2008 to 2016, its subcontractor was filing fraudulent claims for reimbursement. Wise Services used cash, tickets to NASCAR races and other sports events, and other goods as payoffs for MOX Services employees who filed false invoices for non-existent items, the Justice Department stated in its lawsuit.
The companies have been charged with two counts of committing fraud against the federal government, a civil penalty by violating the Anti-Kickback Act, and one count of payment by mistake. MOX Services was separately charged with breach of contract, and Wise with unjust enrichment.
The Justice Department is seeking $19.2 million, three times the $6.4 million allegedly stolen via false claims. The department is also seeking up to $22,363 for each of the two false claim violations, and the same amount for the Anti-Kickback Act violation. The federal government is also seeking financial damages accrued through the breach of contract and through the payment by mistake claim, both of which would be determined during the trial.
