$2 Million Farmers Exchange Case
In
2003 we located yet another bank that had abused the USDA's Farm
Service Agency's Guaranteed Loan Program to cheat its farmer customers
out of hundreds of thousands of dollars in excessive interest. The
headquarters of that bank, The Farmers Exchange Bank of Cherokee,
Oklahoma, is pictured at the right.
Using
the little know century old "Lincoln Law" we filed suit on behalf of
the United States Government in the United States District Court for
the Western District of Oklahoma.
The Lincoln Law
allows private "Whistleblowers" with knowledge of fraud against the US
Government to act as private attorney generals or "Relators" to bring
these actions.
We represented two courageous such
whistleblowers willing to seek recompense for the American Taxpayers
cheated by this fraud using the Lincoln Law.
After considerable
work and investigating we convinced the US Department of Justice to
join us in our litigation and we eventually negotiated a generous
settlement benefiting the American Taxpayers.
This settlement
was consumated in the Spring of 2006 when the Farmers Exchange Bank of
Cherokee, Oklahoma paid over $2.1 Million to the United States
Government. This brought our recoveries for the American people under the FCA to over $18 Million in just 18 months.