North Florida Shipyards and its president have agreed to pay $1 million to the United States to settle claims that they violated the False Claims Act by creating a front company in order to be awarded Coast Guard contracts that were designated for Service Disabled Veteran Owned Small Businesses (SDVOSBs). […]
Ohio Joins Ban of Trinity Guardrail ET-Plus
With Ohio being the most recent state to ban the installation on the Trinity guardrail system ET-Plus, 31 states have now banned the deadly guardrail system. Trinity barely met a deadline of October 31 from a federal agency to provide plans for new tests on the end terminal unit that […]
New York Times Reports on Increasing Concern Over Safety of Takata Airbags
In an article published October 20, 2014, the New York Times reported on safety concerns with Takata airbags and problems with an expanding recall. Due to breadth of the safety issues, both with the sheer number of vehicles and the age of many of the vehicles affected, there has been […]
President of Guardrail Company Admits Trinity Did Not Provide Notice of Design Changes
The president of Trinity Highway Products, Gregory Mitchell, testified at trial that his company did not tell a single state about design changes when they were made in 2005. The testimony came on October 16, 2014 in a False Claims Act case against Trinity. The lawsuit alleged that the company […]
FHWA Calls for Guardrail Maker to Conduct New Crash Tests
In the wake of a jury finding that a leading guardrail maker, Trinity Industries, defrauded the federal government by failing to report design changes to a widely used guardrail system, the Federal Highway Administration demanded that Trinity perform new crash tests on guardrails. In a letter to the president of […]
Whistleblower Trial Finds Trinity Guilty of Defrauding Federal Government
On October 20, 2014, a jury in Texas returned a verdict of $175 million against guardrail manufacturer, Trinity Industries, Inc. (“Trinity”). The jury found that Trinity deliberately withheld information about cost-saving changes to the design of its highway guardrail system that increased the dangers faced by motorists on the nation’s […]
New York Lab To Settle False Claims Act Case for $6 Million
Bostwick Laboratories, Inc., an anatomic and pathology lab based in Uniondale, New York, has agreed to pay $6,048,000 to resolve claims pursued under the False Claims Act. The qui tam (“whistleblower”) lawsuit alleged that Bostwick improperly offered incentives to physicians in exchange for referrals and billed for unordered tests and […]
State of Virginia Will Remove ET-Plus Guardrails
Trinity Industries failed to meet a November 24 deadline given by the state of Virginia to provide results of additional safety testing of the company’s ET-Plus guardrail system. Virginia now plans on removing all of the end terminal units from its roads and will seek reimbursement from Trinity for the […]
ET-Plus Manufacturer Found Guilty of Fraud
The manufacturer of the ET-Plus guardrail system that has been under much scrutiny was found guilty Monday by a Texas jury of defrauding the federal government. Trinity Industries made a design change in 2005 to the end terminal unit without informing the Federal Highway Administration of the change. State governments […]
ET-Plus Guardrail Scrutiny Grows
The state of Virginia in a letter to the manufacturer of the ET-Plus guardrail end terminal stated that it is considering removing all of the guardrails presently installed and not installing any new ET-Plus system unless Trinity Industries conducts testing on the redesigned unit by October 24. Read more here. […]