VTEL, Dish Designated Entities Clash Over Pleadings Motion in AWS-3 Suit

A bid by Dish Network designated entities Northstar Wireless and SNR Wireless for judgment on the pleadings is another "procedural stunt" to stop the fraud suit against them from advancing, Vermont National Telephone said Monday in U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia (docket 1:15-cv-00728) in opposition to the DEs' motion. VTEL said the DEs already waived a False Claims Act's public disclosure bar argument so they can't use that public disclosure bar -- which prohibits an FCA suit based on fraud that already has been made public. It said the public disclosure bar doesn't foreclose this case. In their motion last month, the DEs said the public disclosure bar requires dismissal because the factual fraud allegations and claims were publicly disclosed before the Vermont National complaint. The U.S Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit earlier this year reversed the lower court's dismissal of VTEL's Fair Claims Act suit alleging fraud by the DEs in the 2015 AWS-3 auction (see 2205170026).