About Gregg Shapiro

Contact Gregg Shapiro

617-582-3875
gshapiro@greggshapirolaw.com

Admissions

• Massachusetts
• California

Education

• Harvard Law School, J.D., cum laude, 1992
• Stanford University, A.B., with distinction, 1988

Judicial Clerkship

• The Honorable Vaughn R. Walker, District Judge, United States District Court for the Northern District of California

Publications

• What Circuit Split May Mean For FCA Kickback Liability, Law360 (Aug. 28, 2023)
• Pharmaceutical Company Payments to Co-Pay Foundations Merit Continued Scrutiny, TAFEF News (Dec. 16, 2021)
• Compliance Issues with Overcoming “Friction” in the Sale of Expensive Pharmaceutical Products, American Health Law Association Health Law Weekly (Jan. 15, 2021)
• Chapter: “Enforcement Authorities” in AHLA Pharmaceutical and Medical Device Compliance Manual (2d ed. 2019)

Recent Speaking Engagements

• Panelist on Whistleblowers for Chief Compliance Officer Roundtable at Pharmaceutical & Medical Device Compliance Congress (October 25, 2023)
• Panelist for American Health Law Association Webinar on “False Claims Act Updates: Impact of SuperValu and More” (August 1, 2023)
• Lecturer on False Claims Act at Seton Hall Law School’s US Healthcare Compliance Certificate Program (June 13 and October 10, 2023)
• Moderator of panel on “Interviewing Whistleblowers: Techniques and Cautions” at Federal Bar Association Qui Tam Conference (February 17, 2023)
• Panelist on Infrastructure and Pandemic Relief Funds at American Bar Association 2022 Civil False Claims Institute (September 14, 2022)
• Panelist on Health Care Fraud at Boston Bar Association White-Collar Crime Conference (May 5, 2022)
• Panelist on “Qui Tam Whistleblower Update” at PCF Pharmaceutical and Medical Device Ethics & Compliance Congress and Best Practices Forum (November 4, 2021)
• Panelist, ACI False Claims and Qui Tam Summit for Life Sciences and Healthcare (September 24, 2021)
• Panelist, American Bar Association Criminal Justice Section: False Claims Act Enforcement in 2021 (May 19, 2021)
• Presenter, Federal Bar Association Qui Tam Section:  False Claims Act Today – District of Massachusetts (Apr. 12, 2021)
• Panelist on Parallel Investigations at ACI Advanced Forum on False Claims and Qui Tam Enforcement (Mar. 25, 2021)
• Keynote Speaker on “Health Care Fraud During the Pandemic,” Cleveland-Marshall College of Law conference on Medical/Legal Lessons Learned from the Pandemic (Mar. 19, 2021)
• Guest lecturer on “Civil Health Care Fraud Enforcement,” American University Washington College of Law class on The False Claims Act in Healthcare (Mar. 7, 2021)

After 16 years leading and supervising some of the nation’s biggest False Claims Act investigations as a Department of Justice prosecutor, Gregg Shapiro now specializes in representing whistleblowers and bringing qui tam cases.  In the relatively short time he has been in private practice, Gregg has filed numerous False Claims Act qui tam cases and already has successfully resolved four of them:

• In July 2021, on behalf of a current employee of pharmaceutical manufacturer Ultragenyx Pharmaceutical Inc., Gregg filed a qui tam case alleging that Ultragenyx was paying kickbacks in the form of free genetic tests to induce referrals for an expensive drug called Crysvita. In December 2023, Ultragenyx agreed to pay $6 million to settle the case. In the settlement agreement, Ultragenyx admitted the whistleblower’s core factual allegations. The government awarded Gregg’s client a share of over $1 million from the settlement.
• In January 2022, on behalf of a former employee of furniture manufacturer Yogibo LLC, Gregg filed a qui tam case alleging that Yogibo had underpaid customs duties on material it imported from China. In July 2023, less than 19 months later, Yogibo agreed to pay $217,832 to resolve the case. Gregg’s client received a 20% share of the settlement.
• In June 2021, on behalf of whistleblower Albermarle, LLC, Gregg filed a qui tam case alleging that pharmaceutical company Akorn Operating Company LLC caused false claims to be submitted to Medicare for a drug that was ineligible for Medicare reimbursement because its reference listed drug had switched to over-the-counter. Less than 15 months later, in September 2022, Akorn agreed to pay $7.9 million to resolve the case, and Albermarle received a whistleblower reward of nearly $1 million.
• Also in June 2021, Gregg filed a qui tam case alleging that RGE Motor Direct Inc., a California importer, evaded tariffs on furniture and other merchandise it imported from China. The government declined to intervene in the case, but, in November 2022, less than 17 months after the case was filed, RGE agreed to pay a settlement of $3.25 million. The whistleblower, a Hong Kong national, received a reward of 27.5% of that amount.

During his DOJ career, Gregg served as served as an Assistant United States Attorney in the District of Massachusetts and, from 2013 to 2021, as Chief of the Affirmative Civil Enforcement Unit in that office. As a DOJ prosecutor, Gregg brought cases against pharmaceutical manufacturers and other health care companies that resulted in over $3 billion in recoveries under the False Claims Act. He also oversaw financial fraud cases and other enforcement matters that generated over $5 billion in additional recoveries. For part of 2020, he served as Special Counsel to the Special Inspector General for Pandemic Recovery, where he advised on audits and investigations of recipients of CARES Act funds. Cases that Gregg handled for the government include:

• Athena (2021): $18.25 million settlement to resolve allegations that electronic medical records provider Athena paid a variety of kickbacks to induce existing and potential customers to use its product.
• Co-pay cases (2017-20): Recovered over $1 billion from twelve pharmaceutical manufacturers, four foundations, and a pharmacy to resolve allegations that they conspired to violate the anti-kickback statute by funneling cash through the foundations to cover Medicare co-pays for patients taking the pharmaceutical companies’ drugs.
• Mylan (2017): $465 million settlement to resolve allegations that Mylan avoided paying Medicaid rebates by misclassifying EpiPen as a generic drug.
• Brigham and Women’s Hospital (2017): $10 million settlement to resolve allegations that a hospital researcher fraudulently manipulated research results to obtain NIH grants.
• Wyeth (2016): $784.6 million settlement to resolve allegations that Wyeth used inflated best prices to underpay Medicaid rebates for Protonix oral and Protonix IV.
• RehabCare (2016): $140 million in settlements with RehabCare, the nation’s largest rehabilitation therapy provider, and eight nursing home operators to resolve allegations that RehabCare caused the nursing homes to submit inflated reimbursement claims for therapy.
• Omnicare (2009-13): multiple settlements totaling $275 million to resolve allegations that Omnicare, a nursing home pharmacy, paid kickbacks to nursing homes and accepted kickbacks from Johnson & Johnson.
• Sanofi (2012): $109 million settlement to resolve allegations that Sanofi violated the anti-kickback statute by giving physicians free units of Hyalgan, a knee injection, to induce them to purchase and prescribe the product.

Gregg also supervised these financial fraud cases:

• Royal Bank of Scotland (2018): $4.9 billion settlement to resolve allegations that RBS misled investors in the underwriting and issuance of residential mortgage-backed securities.
• State Street Bank (2016): $382 million settlement to resolve allegations that State Street deceived some of its custody clients when providing them with indirect foreign currency exchange services.

Gregg twice received the Attorney General’s Award for Fraud Prevention, DOJ’s highest honor for fraud prosecutors. He also received the Department of Health and Human Services, Office of Inspector General Award for Excellence three times. In 2022, Taxpayers Against Fraud, the national association of whistleblower attorneys, awarded Gregg and others with its 2022 Public-Private Partnership Award for their work on the $233.7 million False Claims Act settlement with Mallinckrodt, a large pharmaceutical firm that evaded its obligations to pay drug rebates to state Medicaid programs.

He has argued appeals in the United States Courts of Appeal for the First, Second, and District of Columbia Circuits, and has prevailed each time.