George Oilwellian over at Democratic Underground has kept this discussion (here too) alive for some days now, and I see Mr. Lipari himself chimed in over there. He mentioned that he had answered my questions but that I hadn't posted them yet. Well, here they are. I would have rather had a bit more time to sum things up afterwards, but I can do that later on today or tomorrow. He also sent some documents that I haven't gone through yet.
My sincere thanks to Mr. Lipari for his time
Mr. Lipari:
I think I understand the gist of what Medical Supply Chain does, but can you give somebody new to the story your description?
We automate the purchasing and replenishing of supplies for hospitals. Our software creates an electronic marketplace that includes all potential suppliers, the opposite of what happens now. Hospitals save money from the continuing competition. Hospitals also save money from having to use significantly less labor to order and pay for their supplies.
I'm a little confused about the lawsuits. How many have you filed; how many have been resolved one way or another; how many are ongoing and when were they filed?
Its just one lawsuit in reality. I started by seeking just an injunction against US Bank to keep them from preventing my first round of operating funds from being deposited in escrow accounts. By then I knew they were part of the hospital supply cartel through Piper Jaffray. I alleged the conspiracy with Novation and the rest but the law did not require me to make the rest defendants. The defense firms (including Dorsey & Whitney LLP who will figure in the Minnesota USA resignations and later Vinson & Elkins where Gonzales) were able to convince the judge that the injunction request should be dismissed because I did not make the other conspirators defendants. From this gross error onward no decision in federal court has ever reflected the controlling law or facts of the case. Since there were co-conspirators like GE and Neoforma I get to sue them too. I have not yet sued GHX, LLC the electronic marketplace all the competitors formed.
Courts are like legislatures. A lot of lobbying has been done since the 1970’s to discourage enforcement of antitrust law. The law hasn’t changed and was even adopted by the European Union. I think healthcare is so messed up that even judges are now starting to realize the law worked and its enforcement is needed.
You say USAtty Todd P. Graves was "fired." I can't find backup on that. Can you provide?
I have discovery. Everyone is entitled to that information, just tell your public servant Alberto Gonzales to give it to you and if he don’t tell his boss and if Bush doesn’t make it available, start the impeachment.
Unfortunately, I have to limit what I put out because I am still seeking court discovery orders. When they come it will likely be with strict protective orders. This is not a government case. Mr. Gonzales is responsible for the government’s case against Novation. If you want it handled differently, find some way to communicate it to him.
Similarly, you say the three prosecutors who left the Ft. Worth office shortly after the deaths of the two others were "fired." Can you show me documentation of that?
Again, same answer. We are using the word fired for the AUSA’s after the mainstream press started to use it to describe government attorneys who were invited to leave. White collar crime specialists were surplus to the Bush administration.
What was happening specifically in Ft. Worth regarding your case at the time of the death of Thelma Colbert, and again at the time of the death of Shannon Ross, and again at the time of the leaving of the three prosecutors?
Sadly, what was happening is that some people in Justice were watching the Democratic Convention on t.v. They believed in John Kerry and they thought Ashcroft wouldn’t be their boss much longer and they started doing their job.
This was the government case against Novation and they were seeing how Retractible technologies was being kept out of the market by Novation. They also saw how stock in high tech IPO’s (the US Bancorp Piper Jaffray connection) and money changed hands to determine which products were distributed. To this day the press releases about Novation you read are announcements of exclusive deals.
Also the AUSA’s for Texas saw Neoforma that had burned through $900 million dollars and was a publicly traded company with cooked books. Much of it money belonging to hospitals. Later when we kept going after the Justice Department got obstructed, GE had to step in and come up with the money to take Neoforma private since we were proving our case even without discovery.
I don’t know what happened to the Justice department case. We are after Novation for every item they furnish to hospitals not just the few devices Justice was targeting.
You noted that the NYTimes has done two stories on Novation and GPOs in general, in 2002 and 2004, I believe. What, if any, changes to the industry came about because of that? How much, in your mind, still needs changing?
I am a Republican and I am against increased regulation. But I have to admit private action, even when the law was clearly on our side and the defendants were press releasing and making SEC disclosures of the evidence does not work. Regulation may be the only way to deal with the corruption.
How does your lawsuit compare to Retractable Technologies [sic] ? They seem to have won. Why has that case concluded and not yours?
Retractable had been capitalized. When they were hurt by the cartel they were able to obtain great counsel, but ultimately they settled and the market and health workers exposed to the danger by Novation weren’t helped. We kept going and because of the coverage in FW Weekly, the alternative press paper that broke the Enron story, Novation finally announced they would allow competing suppliers for syringes and hospitals would be allowed to buy safe needles. That’s just one line item, I got several thousand more to go.
You said that USAtty Bradley Schlozman, Todd Graves' replacement, "failed to enforce civil rights laws related to the Novation LLC defendants success in getting Medical Supply Chain's counsel Bret D. Landrith disbarred." Can you explain this? (http://www.kscourts.org/kscases/supct/2005/20051209/94333.htm)
I have included articles about Mr. Landrith. We all were shocked that was happening. Now we know that like antitrust law, Justice wasn’t enforcing civil rights law.
What do you say to charges, and I've just heard them recently, that you're claiming connections to the U.S. Attorney firing scandal to get publicity? Or that you're simply a "conspiracy theorist"? Or that you're "lawsuit happy"?
The judge that dismissed the federal claims now being appealed stated his personal opinion about the uncontested facts in my affidavit. I understand where he was coming from. Certainly a federal judge had to approve domestic wire tapping. About a month later Bush came forward and admitted the domestic wire tapping was being done without court orders.
You wrote on April 9, 2007: "Medical Supply Chain founder Samuel Lipari unearthed a US Department of Justice memo revealing the Office of the Attorney General had targeted not eight but ten US Attorneys including the former attorney for the Western District of Missouri, Todd P. Graves." You wrote "not eight but ten," but only named Graves. Who is the ninth USAtty? Can you share the memo?
Again same answer. Get it from Gonzales or be responsible and change out your government officials to ones that follow the law.
What is PressRelease 365? Are you writing all the releases that show up there and on PRBuzz? They don't all carry bylines.
I write or oversee all press releases coming from Medsupply. Our babysitters had word that we were planning a press release with our usual service and in the midst of changing it to meet their requirements they decided that no change we made would be acceptable. So we switched to PressRelease 365 and PR Buzz. Better service, better performance and lower rates. Competition is wonderful.
Are there still Medicare Fraud or similar cases ongoing against Novation and similar GPOs? Do you feel they are being properly acted on?
I think investigations were started. In the culture of Justice even before Bush, the doctors and hospitals were prosecuted, not the GPO’s or even the big insurance administrators. The Blue Cross Blue Shield Medicare administration qui tam cases have a history of Justice protecting the big contractors so that they could make more false claims. Ultimately it’s the beneficiaries of this that have the money needed for political campaigns, not the whistleblowers or efficient honest competitors.
Why isn't this story already more widely known?
I think a lot of people are starting to compare our concentrated ownership press with foreign countries and seeing the harm caused. The British Channel 4 broadcast on our site about Novation is great but then if you are old enough you remember American network tv doing real investigative reporting and you get sad because you can see it isn’t happening any more.
Anything more you'd like to add that you feel people should know?
Keep on your representatives. I think blogs are influential now. During the Gonzales hearing, people started sharing on line their realization that the Judiciary committee didn’t share Leahy and Specter’s commitment to stop the lawlessness at Justice. When the Senators came back from lunch they realized from the feedback that we have much higher expectations of them.
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I hope to be able to follow up next week. Any suggestions about questions that arose or that I missed - you know where to leave them.
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