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The government has intervened in a False Claims Act lawsuit against Tenet Healthcare Corp. (Tenet) and four of its hospitals in Georgia and South Carolina, as well as a hospital in Monroe, Ga., owned by Health Management Associates Inc. (HMA), alleging that the hospitals paid kickbacks to obstetric clinics serving primarily undocumented Hispanic women in return for referral of those patients for labor and delivery at the hospitals. The hospitals then billed the Medicaid programs in Georgia and South Carolina for the services provided to the referred patients and, in some instances, also obtained additional Medicare reimbursement based on the influx of low-income patients.

The former chief executive officer of PetroTiger Ltd., a British Virgin Islands oil and gas company with operations in Colombia and offices in New Jersey, pleaded guilty for his role in a scheme to pay bribes to foreign government officials and to defraud PetroTiger.

Hardman, his business partner and others paid the MSC officials approximately $3,000 each month in cash bribes. During this time, Hardman and his business partner withdrew approximately $144,000 in cash, which was then provided to the two MSC officials in exchange for their assistance in securing MSC contracting and subcontracting business for Hardman’s company.

Vector Planning and Services Inc. (VPSI), an information technology, systems engineering, program management and consulting firm headquartered in Chantilly, Va. , has agreed to pay the government $6.5 million to settle False Claims Act allegations that the company inflated claims for payment under several Navy contracts, the Justice Department announced. VPSI’s West Coast center of operations is in San Diego, Calif.

Irene Tamika Smith, a former professional tax-return preparer, was sentenced to serve 33 months in prison for conspiring with her co-workers to defraud the United States by filing false tax returns in order to receive fraudulently-inflated refunds for clients, Assistant Attorney General Kathryn Keneally of the Justice Department's Tax Division and U.S. Attorney Michael J. Moore for the Middle District of Georgia announced. Smith was also ordered to pay $566,171 in restitution to the Internal Revenue Service (IRS).

Monajem Hakimijoo, also known as Manny Hakimi, of Beverly Hills, Calif., pleaded guilty on Feb. 13, 2014, in the U.S. District Court for the Central District of California to filing a false federal income tax return for tax year 2007, the Justice Department and Internal Revenue Service (IRS) announced.

At the federal courthouse in Brooklyn, N.Y., Akbar Ahmad Sherzai, 49, of Centreville, Va., an independent contractor for a trucking company operating in Afghanistan that was responsible for delivering fuel to U.S. Army installations, pleaded guilty to his role in offering a U.S. Army serviceman $54,000 in bribes to falsify documents to reflect the successful delivery of fuel shipments that Army records indicate were never delivered.

A Rockford man and a Califomia man were indicted by a federal grand jury in Rockford on fraud charges. Todd C. Smith, 46, of Rockford, was charged with seven counts of mail fraud and 10 counts of wire fraud, and Travis Oliver, 36, of Tremecula, California, was charged with eight counts of mail fraud and 15 counts of wire fraud in connection with a scheme to defraud investors by falsely representing to investors that their investments in Electus Asset Holdings were guaranteed, thereby fraudulently obtaining more than $983,000 from the investors.

In Brownsville, former Cameron County District Attorney Armando R. Villalobos was sentenced to 13 years in federal prison for his role in a South Texas bribery and extortion scheme announced United States Attorney Robert Pitman.

The leader of a fraud ring that engaged in identity theft and financial crimes that have led to charges against 54 individuals was sentenced to 144 months in prison for directing the large-scale, sophisticated criminal enterprise, U.S. Attorney Paul J. Fishman announced.