A minnesota construction and paving company has agreed to pay about $ 1.3 million to resolve complaints that, consciously, the results of the tests falsified for their paving material to be higher quality than they were and sent these counterfeit results to state and federal governments in order to receive pavement projects in Minnesota.
The United States and the State of Minnesota claimed that between 2017 and 2022 Anderson Brothers Construction of Brainerd, Minn., Usually did the results of certain asphalt quality tests to be performed on its paving material. It is supposed to present these results to state and federal governments, which assumed that he received financial incentives for better quality paving materials and avoiding deductions for lower quality material.
Of the civil settlement of almost $ 1.3, the federal government will receive $ 660,761 and the state of Minnesota will receive $ 634,849.
The complaints came to light after Kacie Dixon, an old bituminous mix technique in Anderson, filed a complainant demand in 2022, claiming that the company had violated the false law of claims, which prohibits submitting false or fraudulent claim to the Government to pay. The state and federal governments joined as claimants.
In his demand, Dixon said he observed and documented the “ failure of the accused of performing appropriate tests on appropriate materials; knowing the omission of inadequate results to appear; not re -elaborating the known sections; the provision of materials that failed underground will be used to complete the projects and obtaining the exchange orders for fake information to cover the fake information to cover materials ”.
The demand specifies 25 projects that include airports, roads, regional roads, schools and streets that were made with counterfeit test results. He also claims that Dixon registered “dozens of conversations related to the illegal regime of the defendants” and reported that the results of the tests to the company’s increases were forged, but these reports “fell on the deaf ears”.
In one case, for example, Dixon said that an operation manager asked him to fake a gradation test of a track extension project at Detroit Lakes-Becker County Airport, and that the manager also falsified the numbers in the test core strips.
“If this airport was crowned again, it would be shown that the so -called aggregate used for this project was in fact so soft rock that it could be broken with a spiral driver,” says the demand for a federal grant of $ 12.8 million, a state subsidy of $ 200,000 and $ 1 million each of Becker County and Detroit, Minn.
“Minnesotans expect their won tax dollars to go to things like roads, bridges, schools and public security, not in the pockets of corrupt contractors,” said State Attorney General Keith Ellison in a statement. “My gratitude comes to the complainants like Kacie Dixon who help us fight fraud and to protect our public resources. Serve another notice that I will not hesitate to pursue those who cheat on the taxpayers of Minnesota.”
As part of the trial, Anderson has also agreed to ban the future tests, provide employee training and implement a corporate code of ethics, a general corporate compliance program and a quality quality/quality control program that is supervised by a corporate compliance officer. He has also signed a compliance control agreement with the Minnesota Department of Transportation.
Terry McFarlin, President and CEO of Anderson Brothers, said in a statement that Anderson Brothers “reached an agreement without guilt to resolve government investigation into his past test protocols.”
“We are pleased to have resolved Government’s concerns about our past test protocols through an agreement without failure. It allows us to avoid the time, distraction and expenditure of long government litigation and, on the other hand, to focus on taking care of our customers,” he said.
He added that the affected work represented 0.5% of the value of the company’s projects at that time.
