Minnesota's False Claims Act: Treble Damages, a 30 Percent Relator's Share, and One Published Case

Minnesota has had its own False Claims Act since 2009. It carries treble damages, a civil penalty now pegged to the federal one, mandatory fee-shifting to a winning plaintiff, and a bounty of up to 30 percent of everything recovered. On paper it is one of the more generous private enforcement statutes in the Minnesota code.

In the seventeen years since it was enacted, it has produced exactly one published Minnesota appellate decision construing it. That decision, Phone Recovery Services, LLC v. Qwest Corp., went to the supreme court and the relator lost — not on the merits of the fraud, not on the seal, not on the public-disclosure bar, but on a single-sentence exclusion in Minn. Stat. § 15C.03 that most people skim past on their way to the liability section. That sentence is the first thing I read when someone brings me a chapter 15C theory, and it is the reason I turn most of them down.

Here is the whole chapter, what it actually says, and where the traps are.

What is actually in chapter 15C

Seventeen section numbers exist. Sixteen carry text. One — § 15C.14 — was repealed in 2013, and what was taken out of it matters, which I get to below.

The live sections are: definitions (§ 15C.01); liability (§ 15C.02); the exclusion (§ 15C.03); the prosecuting attorney’s own authority (§ 15C.04); private remedies, the seal, and the public-disclosure bar (§ 15C.05); intervention (§ 15C.06); service and the answer (§ 15C.07); the division of labor once the case is unsealed (§ 15C.08); the discovery stay (§ 15C.09); court-imposed limits on the relator’s participation (§ 15C.10); limitations and burden of proof (§ 15C.11); expenses and attorney fees (§ 15C.12); the relator’s share (§ 15C.13); retaliation (§ 15C.145); where the money goes (§ 15C.15); and the attorney general’s annual report to the legislature (§ 15C.16).

Two amendments did the real work. Laws 2013, chapter 16 rewrote six sections, added the retaliation section, and repealed § 15C.14. Laws 2019, First Special Session, chapter 9, article 2, section 5 changed how the penalty is calculated. Nothing in the chapter was touched in the 2026 session.

The conduct the statute reaches, and the knowledge it requires

Section 15C.02(a) lists seven prohibited acts. The two that matter most in ordinary practice are the first and the last.

(1) knowingly presents, or causes to be presented, a false or fraudulent claim for payment or approval;

(7) knowingly makes or uses, or causes to be made or used, a false record or statement material to an obligation to pay or transmit money or property to the state or a political subdivision, or knowingly conceals or knowingly and improperly avoids or decreases an obligation to pay or transmit money or property to the state or a political subdivision.

Clause (7), together with clause (4), is the reverse false claim — the theory that a defendant kept money it owed the government rather than took money it was not owed. The supreme court in Phone Recovery identified clauses (a)(4) and (a)(7) as “the reverse-false-claims provisions” and analyzed them as such. Phone Recovery Servs., LLC v. Qwest Corp., 919 N.W.2d 315, 318 (Minn. 2018).

The knowledge standard is not fraud in the common-law sense. Under § 15C.01, subdivision 3, “knowing” and “knowingly” mean the defendant “(1) has actual knowledge of the information; (2) acts in deliberate ignorance of the truth or falsity of the information; or (3) acts in reckless disregard of the truth or falsity of the information.” The subdivision then closes the loop from both ends:

No proof of specific intent to defraud is required, but in no case is a person who acts merely negligently, inadvertently, or mistakenly with respect to information deemed to have acted knowingly.

Section 15C.02(d) says the same thing again from the defense side: no liability “for mere negligence, inadvertence, or mistake with respect to activities involving a false or fraudulent claim.” The legislature said it twice. I read that as a deliberate instruction to district courts that ordinary billing sloppiness is not a false claim, and I have watched that instruction do more work than any other sentence in the chapter.

Two definitions added in 2013 carry weight far out of proportion to their length. “Material” means “having a natural tendency to influence, or be capable of influencing, the payment or receipt of money or property.” § 15C.01, subd. 3a. “Obligation” means “an established duty, whether or not fixed, arising from an express or implied contractual, grantor-grantee, or licensor-licensee relationship from a fee-based or similar relationship, from statute or regulation, or from the retention of any overpayment.” § 15C.01, subd. 3b. That last clause is the whole reverse-false-claim theory in nine words: keep an overpayment you know about, and you have an obligation you can be accused of avoiding.

“Claim” is broader than the word suggests. It reaches demands made to a contractor or grantee rather than to the government itself, so long as the money is to be spent on the government’s behalf and the government supplied or will reimburse a portion of it, and it reaches money the state does not hold title to. § 15C.01, subd. 2. It excludes state employment compensation and unrestricted income subsidies. Id.

The penalty is no longer written in Minnesota law

Until July 1, 2019, § 15C.02(a) set a civil penalty “of not less than $5,500 and not more than $11,000 per false or fraudulent claim”. Laws 2019, First Special Session, chapter 9, article 2, section 5 struck that language — the dollars and the words “per false or fraudulent claim” together — and replaced it with a cross-reference. The section now reads:

A person who commits any act described in clauses (1) to (7) is liable to the state or the political subdivision for a civil penalty in the amounts set forth in the federal False Claims Act, United States Code, title 31, section 3729, and as modified by the federal Civil Penalties Inflation Adjustment Act Improvements Act of 2015, plus three times the amount of damages that the state or the political subdivision sustains because of the act of that person …

So the amount of a Minnesota false-claims penalty is not stated in the Minnesota statute, and it is not stated in the United States Code either. The federal statute recites a civil penalty “of not less than $5,000 and not more than $10,000, as adjusted by the Federal Civil Penalties Inflation Adjustment Act of 1990”. 31 U.S.C. § 3729(a)(1). Those two numbers have not been the operative numbers for decades. The operative numbers live in a Justice Department regulation, 28 C.F.R. § 85.5, which is re-adjusted annually for inflation under the 2015 Improvements Act that § 15C.02(a) names.

For penalties assessed after July 3, 2025, that regulation sets the False Claims Act minimum at $14,308 and the maximum at $28,619. 28 C.F.R. § 85.5 (table 1, row “31 U.S.C. 3729(a)”); see Civil Monetary Penalties Inflation Adjustments for 2025, 90 Fed. Reg. 29445, 29447 (July 3, 2025).

Those are also the 2026 numbers, and the reason is worth knowing. The inflation formula runs off the October CPI-U for the prior year. The October–November 2025 lapse in appropriations meant the Bureau of Labor Statistics never produced October 2025 CPI-U data, the statute allows no substitute method, and the Office of Management and Budget cancelled the 2026 adjustment government-wide in memorandum M-26-11. The Justice Department published a notice on July 15, 2026 confirming that “its civil monetary penalty amounts will not increase for the 2026 calendar year.” Civil Monetary Penalties Inflation Adjustments for 2026, 91 Fed. Reg. 43405 (July 15, 2026). A Minnesota false-claims penalty in 2026 is a 2025 penalty.

Damages are trebled by default. The court may assess “not less than two times” instead, but only on all three of the § 15C.02(b) conditions: the defendant furnished the responsible state or local investigator with everything it knew “within 30 days after the date on which the person first obtained the information”, it fully cooperated with the investigation, and at the time it came forward no criminal, civil, or administrative action had begun and it had no actual knowledge of an investigation. Thirty days is a short window, and it starts running from the defendant’s own knowledge, not from the government’s. A defendant also owes “the costs of a civil action brought to recover any penalty or damages.” § 15C.02(c).

Why the chapter is shaped the way it is

Chapter 15C reads oddly in places until you notice what it was drafted against. Congress offers states a financial inducement to enact a false claims act: under 42 U.S.C. § 1396h(a), where a state has a qualifying law, “the Federal medical assistance percentage with respect to any amounts recovered under a State action brought under such law, shall be decreased by 10 percentage points” — meaning the state keeps ten points more of every Medicaid fraud recovery.

Qualifying is a checklist. Subsection (b) requires that the Department of Health and Human Services’ Inspector General, consulting with the Attorney General, determine that the state law does four things. Three of them map onto provisions of chapter 15C that otherwise look arbitrary:

• § 1396h(b)(3) requires “a requirement for filing an action under seal for 60 days with review by the State Attorney General.” That is § 15C.05(d) and § 15C.06(a), and it is why a Minnesota qui tam case is commenced by filing rather than by service.
• § 1396h(b)(2) requires provisions “at least as effective in rewarding and facilitating qui tam actions for false or fraudulent claims as those described in sections 3730 through 3732 of title 31.” That is what the 2013 rewrite of the original-source and public-disclosure provisions was chasing, after Congress rewrote the federal versions.
• § 1396h(b)(4) requires “a civil penalty that is not less than the amount of the civil penalty authorized under section 3729 of title 31.” A fixed $5,500–$11,000 band written in 2009 cannot satisfy a moving federal target indefinitely. Replacing it in 2019 with a live cross-reference to the federal amounts solves that permanently.

Minnesota also budgeted for the incentive on the face of the statute: § 15C.15, subdivision 1(2) directs that the portion of net proceeds equal to “the additional recovery of federal money authorized by United States Code, title 42, section 1396h” be credited to a dedicated false claims account. Read chapter 15C as a state statute drafted to a federal specification and its structure stops being mysterious.

How a qui tam case is filed, and the two deadlines that are not the ones you know

A private person may sue on the person’s own account and that of the state, of a political subdivision, or of both. § 15C.05(a). Once filed, the relator cannot walk away alone: the action “may be voluntarily dismissed only if the court and the prosecuting attorney give written consent to the dismissal and their reasons for consenting.” Id.

Now the mechanics, which do not match ordinary Minnesota civil practice in two places.

Filing commences the action, not service. Minnesota is a service state. Rule 3.01 says a civil action is commenced against a defendant “when the summons is served upon that defendant”, or on a signed waiver, or on delivery to the sheriff. Section 15C.05(d) reverses that:

A complaint in an action under this section must be commenced by filing the complaint with the court in chambers and the court must place it under seal for at least 60 days. No service may be made upon the defendant until the complaint is unsealed.

Read “at least” carefully. Sixty days is a floor, not a term. Section 15C.06(a) gives the prosecuting attorney 60 days from receipt of the complaint and disclosure to intervene or decline, “or, for good cause shown, move the court to extend the time for doing so.” The motion “may be supported by affidavits or other submissions in chambers.” The complaint is unsealed only after the intervention decision is made. § 15C.06(b). In practice a relator should plan on a seal measured in seasons.

Filing is not the only thing the relator must do. Under § 15C.05(e), the relator serves the complaint on the prosecuting attorney under the Rules of Civil Procedure “and at the same time shall serve a written disclosure of all material evidence and information the plaintiff possesses.” That disclosure statement is the document that decides whether the case gets intervened in. It is not a pleading, it is not filed, and it is the most consequential thing a relator’s lawyer writes.

The defendant gets 20 days, not 21. Section 15C.07 provides that the unsealed complaint “must be served on the defendant pursuant to rule 3 of the Minnesota Rules of Civil Procedure. The defendant must respond to the complaint within 20 days after it is served on the defendant.” Rule 12.01 gives an ordinary Minnesota defendant 21 days to serve an answer. A defense lawyer calendaring a chapter 15C answer off habit is one day late.

Two more mechanics. Discovery by the relator can be stayed for up to 60 days on a showing that it would interfere with a civil or criminal investigation arising out of the same facts, and extended on a further showing of diligence — but discovery “may not be stayed for a total of more than six months over the objection of the person who brought the action, except for good cause shown by the prosecuting attorney.” § 15C.09(a)–(b). And once the government intervenes, the court can shrink the relator to a spectator. On a showing that unrestricted participation would interfere with or unduly delay the action, or would be “repetitious, irrelevant, or solely for harassment”, § 15C.10 lets the court limit the relator “by limiting the number of witnesses, the length of the testimony of the witnesses, the cross-examination of witnesses by the person, or by other measures.”

What does a relator actually get paid?

Section 15C.13 sets three tracks. The share is a percentage of “any recovery of the civil penalty and damages or settlement” — so the bounty runs on the trebled damages and the penalties, not on single damages.

The declined case pays the most. That is the trade the statute offers: carry the whole litigation yourself and keep a quarter to a third of it.

One thing reduces the share before the percentage is ever applied, and it is easy to miss because it sits in the last sentence of the section. Where a recovery’s distribution is governed by federal code or rule — which is to say, most Medicaid-related recoveries — “the basis for calculating the portion of the recovery the person is entitled to receive shall not include amounts reserved for distribution to the federal government or designated in their use by federal code or rule.” § 15C.13. The relator’s percentage is taken from the state’s slice, not from the gross.

Fees are separate and they are mandatory. If the prosecuting attorney or the relator “prevails in or settles an action under this chapter, the court shall award” reasonable costs, reasonable attorney fees, and reasonable expert consultant and expert witness fees. Those expenses “must be awarded against the defendant and are not allowed against the state or a political subdivision.” § 15C.12. Before 2013 that sentence read that the court “may authorize” the plaintiff “to recover” those amounts; Laws 2013, chapter 16, section 5 turned the permission into a command. Plead it expressly. A relator weighing chapter 15C against the other private-enforcement routes Minnesota offers — the private attorney general statute and the Consumer Fraud Act among them — should compare the fee provisions side by side rather than assume they operate alike.

The public-disclosure bar, which no Minnesota court has ever applied

Section 15C.05(f) is Minnesota’s public-disclosure bar, and it is written as a command to the court:

A court must dismiss an action or claim under this section, unless opposed by the prosecuting attorney, if substantially the same allegations or transactions as alleged in the action or claim were publicly disclosed:

(1) in a criminal, civil, or administrative hearing in which the state or a political subdivision or its agent is a party;

(2) in a report, hearing, audit, or investigation of the legislature, the governing body of a political subdivision, the legislative auditor, or the state auditor; or

(3) by the news media.

Three features deserve attention. First, “substantially the same” is the trigger, not identity — a relator who read a state auditor’s report and filed a sharper version of it is inside the bar. Second, dismissal is mandatory but not unconditional: the prosecuting attorney can stop it simply by opposing it, which makes the government’s view of the relator worth as much as the relator’s own briefing. Third, “by the news media” carries no limiting language at all — no requirement that the coverage be about this defendant’s conduct in particular, and no carve-out for trade press.

The escape hatch is the original-source exception. The paragraph “does not apply if the action or claim is brought by the prosecuting attorney or the person bringing the action or claim is an original source of the information.” § 15C.05(f). And “original source”, rewritten in 2013 to track the modern federal definition, means a person who either

(1) prior to a public disclosure under section 15C.05, paragraph (f), has voluntarily disclosed to the state or a political subdivision the information on which allegations or transactions in a claim are based; or

(2) has knowledge that is independent of and materially adds to the publicly disclosed allegations or transactions, and has voluntarily provided the information to the state or a political subdivision before filing an action under this chapter.

Both branches require a voluntary disclosure to the government before something — before the public disclosure under branch (1), before filing under branch (2). The disclosure to the government is not a formality a relator can backfill after a motion to dismiss lands.

Now the part that surprises people: no Minnesota appellate court has ever construed either provision. That is not an inference from silence. The only published decision on the chapter passed on the question twice, expressly, at both levels. The court of appeals wrote that because the tax bar disposed of the case, “we do not reach respondents’ arguments that appellant’s claims fail under the public-disclosure bar and Minn. R. Civ. P. 9.02, which requires that fraud be pleaded with particularity.” Phone Recovery Servs., LLC v. Qwest Corp., 901 N.W.2d 185, 199 n.13 (Minn. App. 2017), aff’d, 919 N.W.2d 315 (Minn. 2018). The supreme court said the same, declining to address “respondents’ arguments regarding the MFCA’s public-disclosure bar or pleading fraud with particularity as required by Minn. R. Civ. P. 9.02.” 919 N.W.2d at 325 n.9.

Anyone briefing § 15C.05(f) in a Minnesota district court is arguing from the statutory text and from federal authority on a differently worded federal statute. There is no Minnesota case to cite, and I would not let a client believe otherwise.

There is a separate, blunter bar in § 15C.05(c): no action may be maintained against the state, the legislature, the judiciary, the executive branch, a political subdivision, or their officers, members, or employees “if the action is based on evidence or information known to the state or political subdivision when the action was brought”, and none may be maintained on allegations or transactions already the subject of a civil action or administrative penalty proceeding to which the government is a party.

Can a second relator file on the same facts?

No. Section 15C.05(b): “If an action is brought under this section, no other person may bring another action under this section based on the same facts that are the subject of the pending action.” One sentence, no exceptions written into it, and no Minnesota decision construing what “the same facts” means. Because the first complaint is under seal, a second relator will not know it exists. The race is real and it is run blind.

The tax bar is the first thing I check

Section 15C.03 is one sentence:

This chapter does not apply to claims, records, or statements made under portions of Minnesota Statutes relating to taxation.

Read quickly, that sounds like it carves out the income tax and the sales tax. It does not. It is the broadest exclusion in the chapter, and Phone Recovery is why.

The relator there alleged that telecommunications carriers had knowingly under-collected and underpaid the 911 fee, the Telecommunications Access Minnesota charge, and the Telephone Assistance Plan surcharge, and pleaded it as a reverse false claim under § 15C.02(a)(4) and (7). The defendants moved to dismiss on § 15C.03. The district court dismissed, the court of appeals affirmed, and the supreme court affirmed again.

The supreme court held the phrase unambiguous and gave it this reach — it “refers to the provisions of Minnesota Statutes that pertain, refer, or stand in some relation to the levying, imposition, assessment, or collection of taxes.” 919 N.W.2d at 320. It then held that a single statute — or a single subdivision of a statute — can be a “portion” relating to taxation even where the rest of the chapter is not. Id. at 321.

The reason this swallows so much is the definition the court then applied. Minnesota Statutes § 645.44, subdivision 19, supplies a general definition that governs across the code unless another intention clearly appears:

(a) “Tax” means any fee, charge, exaction, or assessment imposed by a governmental entity on an individual, person, entity, transaction, good, service, or other thing. It excludes a price that an individual or entity chooses voluntarily to pay in return for receipt of goods or services provided by the governmental entity. …

(b) For purposes of applying the laws of this state, a “fee,” “charge,” or other similar term that satisfies the functional requirements of paragraph (a) must be treated as a tax for all purposes, regardless of whether the statute or law names or describes it as a tax.

Put the two together and the result is what the court reached: three charges the legislature had labeled a “fee,” a “charge,” and a “surcharge” were all taxes, and every claim built on them was outside chapter 15C. 919 N.W.2d at 324. The court was unmistakably aware of the consequence and unmistakably unwilling to fix it: “If the Legislature did not intend for the tax bar to be as broad as the plain meaning of Minn. Stat. § 15C.03 provides, that is a matter for the Legislature, not for us, to correct.” Id. at 325.

The legislature has not corrected it. Section 15C.03 has never been amended — its History line still reads “2009 c 101 art 2 s 26” and nothing else. So before I evaluate a chapter 15C theory on its merits, I ask one question: is the money the defendant allegedly kept or obtained a mandatory governmental exaction rather than a voluntary price for a government good or service? If it is an exaction, § 645.44, subdivision 19 makes it a tax, § 15C.03 makes the chapter inapplicable, and the case is over on a Rule 12 motion no matter how good the fraud looks. Reverse-false-claim theories built on regulatory fees, surcharges, assessments, and program charges are the ones most exposed, because those are precisely the charges the legislature likes to call something other than a tax.

Retaliation: the remedy got narrower in 2013

Section 15C.145 protects an “employee, contractor, or agent” who is “discharged, demoted, suspended, threatened, harassed, or in any other manner discriminated against in the terms and conditions of employment because of lawful acts done by the employee, contractor, agent, or associated others in furtherance of an action under this chapter or other efforts to stop one or more violations of this chapter.” § 15C.145(a). Note that protection does not require filing anything — “other efforts to stop one or more violations” covers internal complaints.

Relief “shall include reinstatement with the same seniority status that the employee, contractor, or agent would have had but for the discrimination, two times the amount of back pay, interest on the back pay, and compensation for any special damages sustained as a result of the discrimination, including litigation costs and reasonable attorney fees.” § 15C.145(b). A retaliation action “may not be brought more than three years after the date when the retaliation occurred.” § 15C.145(c).

Here is what nobody tells the client. The 2013 act that created § 15C.145 simultaneously repealed § 15C.14, and § 15C.14 had two things the new section does not. It made damages recoverable “including reinstatement, twice the amount of lost compensation, interest on the lost compensation, any special damage sustained as a result of the discrimination, and punitive damages if appropriate.” Minn. Stat. 2012, § 15C.14(c). And it opened with a flat prohibition that has no successor:

An employer must not adopt or enforce any rule or policy forbidding an employee to disclose information to the state, a political subdivision, or a law enforcement agency, or to act in furtherance of an action under this chapter, including investigation for, bringing, or testifying in the action.

Minn. Stat. 2012, § 15C.14(a); repealed by Laws 2013, ch. 16, § 8. The 2013 rewrite widened coverage — contractors and agents came in, and so did conduct short of filing suit — and it added a three-year limitations period that § 15C.14 did not contain. It also deleted punitive damages and the anti-gag-policy prohibition, and put nothing in their place. Anyone comparing chapter 15C retaliation to the Minnesota Whistleblower Act should run both, not assume the false-claims remedy is the stronger one.

How long you have

Section 15C.11(a) is drafted in a way that rewards slow reading:

An action under this chapter may not be commenced more than three years after the date of discovery of the fraudulent activity by the prosecuting attorney or more than six years after the fraudulent activity occurred, whichever occurs later, but in no event more than ten years after the date on which the violation is committed.

Six years from the conduct is the floor, not the ceiling. Discovery by the prosecuting attorney — not by the relator — can push the deadline out to three years past that discovery, capped absolutely at ten years from the violation. A relator who has been sitting on information for five years has not necessarily started anyone’s clock.

One drafting point that saves cases: if the government intervenes and files its own pleading, “any prosecuting attorney pleading relates back to the filing date of the complaint of the person who originally brought the action,” to the extent the government’s claim arises out of the same conduct, transactions, or occurrences. § 15C.08(d). The seal period does not cost the state its limitations position.

The burden is the ordinary civil one. Both the government and any relator “must prove the essential elements of the cause of action, including damages, by a preponderance of the evidence.” § 15C.11(c). And a criminal conviction for false statement or fraud — by verdict, guilty plea, or nolo contendere — estops the defendant from denying an essential element of that offense in a chapter 15C action on the same transaction. § 15C.11(b).

Cities and counties are in, and the county attorney runs the case

Political subdivisions are covered as thoroughly as the state. “Political subdivision” means a political subdivision of the state “and includes a department or agency of a political subdivision.” § 15C.01, subd. 6. Section 15C.02(a) makes a violator liable “to the state or the political subdivision”, and the definition of “claim” reaches money and property provided by either. § 15C.01, subd. 2.

The consequence practitioners miss is who prosecutes. “Prosecuting attorney” means:

(1) the attorney general, if the false or fraudulent claim involves money, property, or services provided by the state; or

(2) the county attorney, city attorney, or other attorney representing a political subdivision, if the false or fraudulent claim involves money, property, or services provided by the political subdivision.

§ 15C.01, subd. 7. A relator alleging fraud on a county road contract serves the county attorney, and it is the county attorney’s 60-day intervention decision that governs. A case touching both state and local money has two prosecuting attorneys and two decisions. Contractors on public projects should read this next to the payment bond statute: the same invoice can be a bond claim in one direction and a false claim in the other.

The attorney general also has authority independent of any relator. Under § 15C.04, the attorney general may investigate violations and sue to enjoin them and recover damages and penalties, and in an investigation holds “the powers listed in section 8.31, subdivisions 2 and 3” — which include serving interrogatories and demanding documents “without commencement of a civil action and without leave of court,” Minn. Stat. § 8.31, subd. 2, and suing for injunctive relief plus a civil penalty of up to $25,000, id., subd. 3.

What a relator risks

The upside of a chapter 15C case gets quoted to clients far more often than the downside. There are five items on the downside and every one of them is written into the statute.

Fee exposure running the wrong way. Section 15C.12 does not only shift fees to a losing defendant. If the prosecuting attorney declines, the relator carries the case, and the defendant wins, “the court shall award to the defendant reasonable expenses and attorney fees against the person bringing the action if it finds that the action was clearly frivolous or vexatious or brought in substantial part for harassment.” The standard is high. The exposure is personal and it is uncapped.

No control over the outcome. Whether or not it intervenes, the prosecuting attorney may move to dismiss the action for good cause, and may settle it. The relator gets notice and a hearing, and can present evidence — and can still lose. The government “may settle the action with the defendant notwithstanding the objections of the person initiating the action if the court determines, after a hearing, that the proposed settlement is fair, adequate, and reasonable under all the circumstances.” § 15C.08(e).

The alternate-remedy route. The prosecuting attorney may bypass the lawsuit entirely and pursue “any alternate remedy available to the state, including an administrative proceeding to determine a civil monetary penalty.” § 15C.06(c). The relator keeps the same rights in that proceeding, and a final finding or conclusion there is “conclusive on all parties” back in the § 15C.05 action.

A long seal with no leverage. The complaint sits sealed for at least 60 days, routinely longer, during which the relator cannot serve, cannot take discovery, and cannot tell anyone. Employment continues, or it does not, and § 15C.145 is the only backstop.

And the base rate. Chapter 15C has been law since 2009 — seventeen years — and there is one published Minnesota appellate decision construing it. The relator lost, and lost on a threshold exclusion. The supreme court has cited the chapter since only in passing, most recently as an example of a legislative grant of statutory standing. Warren v. ACOVA, Inc., No. A24-0450, slip op. at 19 (Minn. Aug. 5, 2026) (citing Minn. Stat. § 15C.05 and Phone Recovery, 919 N.W.2d at 319). That is a thin body of law on which to bet a career and a fee award.

Where the money goes

The state’s net proceeds are split three ways under § 15C.15, subdivision 1: an amount equal to the state’s actual damages goes back to the fund that sustained them; the portion equal to the additional federal money authorized by 42 U.S.C. § 1396h is credited to a dedicated false claims account, capped at $1,000,000 in a fiscal year; and the remainder goes to the general fund. The false claims account itself sits in the special revenue fund, may be funded by interagency agreement “to deposit up to $2,055,000 for litigation and related expenses under this chapter”, and is annually appropriated to the attorney general. § 15C.15, subd. 2.

Finally, § 15C.16 requires the attorney general to report to the legislative committees with jurisdiction over state government finance by January 15 each year, and to include “the number of complaints received by the attorney general under section 15C.05” and “the number of times the attorney general intervened and declined to intervene after receiving a complaint”, plus attorney and staff time and net proceeds by action. If you want to know how much use this statute is actually getting, that report is where the legislature put the answer.

Madgett Law, LLC

I evaluate Minnesota False Claims Act theories for people who have found something inside a company that bills the state, a county, or a city — and I evaluate them honestly, starting with § 15C.03 and the public-disclosure bar rather than with the size of the number. When a case works, I handle the disclosure statement, the sealed filing, and the intervention pitch. When it does not, I say so before anyone spends a year under seal, and I look at whether the better claim is a retaliation claim, a whistleblower claim, or something else entirely. The firm also defends businesses and nonprofits accused of false claims, including charities and contractors that take state or local money. Call 612-470-6529 or send us a message.

Sources: Minn. Stat. § 15C.01, subds. 2, 3, 3a, 3b, 4, 5, 6, 7 (definitions of claim, knowing, material, obligation, original source, person, political subdivision, prosecuting attorney); § 15C.02(a)(1)–(7), (b)(1)–(3), (c), (d) (prohibited acts, penalty by reference to the federal act, treble and double damages, costs, no liability for negligence); § 15C.03 (tax bar); § 15C.04, subds. 1, 2 (attorney general authority; § 8.31 powers); § 15C.05(a)–(f) (private remedies, voluntary dismissal, first-to-file, government-knowledge bar, filing and 60-day seal, disclosure statement, public-disclosure bar); § 15C.06(a)–(c) (60-day intervention decision, unsealing, alternate remedy); § 15C.07 (service under Rule 3; 20-day response); § 15C.08(a)–(e) (roles on declination and intervention, relation back, government dismissal and settlement); § 15C.09(a)–(b) (discovery stay; six-month outer limit); § 15C.10 (limits on relator participation); § 15C.11(a)–(c) (limitations, criminal estoppel, preponderance burden); § 15C.12 (mandatory fees to a prevailing plaintiff; fee exposure for a clearly frivolous, vexatious, or harassing relator); § 15C.13 (relator’s share on each track; exclusion of federally reserved amounts from the base); § 15C.145(a)–(c) (retaliation; double back pay; three-year limit); § 15C.15, subds. 1, 2 (distribution; false claims account); § 15C.16 (annual report); Minn. Stat. 2012, § 15C.14(a), (c) (repealed anti-gag rule and punitive damages), repealed by Laws 2013, ch. 16, § 8; Minn. Stat. § 8.31, subds. 2, 3 (pre-suit discovery; injunctive relief and $25,000 penalty); § 645.02 (July 1 effective date for an act having appropriation items); § 645.44, subd. 19(a), (b) (definition of tax and mandatory treatment of fees as taxes). Laws 2013, ch. 16, §§ 1–8 (2013 rewrite and repealer); Laws 2019, 1st Spec. Sess., ch. 9, art. 2, § 5 (replacement of the $5,500–$11,000 penalty band with the federal cross-reference). Phone Recovery Servs., LLC v. Qwest Corp., 901 N.W.2d 185, 199 n.13 (Minn. App. 2017) (declining to reach the public-disclosure bar and Rule 9.02), aff’d, 919 N.W.2d 315 (Minn. 2018) (at 318, clauses (a)(4) and (a)(7) identified as the reverse-false-claims provisions; at 319, private cause of action under § 15C.05; at 320, “relating to taxation” construed; at 321, a single subdivision may be a “portion”; at 324, the surcharges are taxes; at 325, the tax bar’s breadth is for the legislature; at 325 n.9, declining to reach the public-disclosure bar). Warren v. ACOVA, Inc., No. A24-0450, slip op. at 19 (Minn. Aug. 5, 2026) (Minnesota False Claims Act as a legislative grant of a private right of action). 31 U.S.C. § 3729(a)(1) (federal penalty subject to inflation adjustment); 28 C.F.R. § 85.5, tbl. 1 (adjusted False Claims Act minimum $14,308 and maximum $28,619 for penalties assessed after July 3, 2025); Civil Monetary Penalties Inflation Adjustments for 2025, 90 Fed. Reg. 29445, 29447 (July 3, 2025); Civil Monetary Penalties Inflation Adjustments for 2026, 91 Fed. Reg. 43405 (July 15, 2026) (no 2026 increase; OMB Memorandum M-26-11); 42 U.S.C. § 1396h(a), (b)(2)–(4) (10-percentage-point increase in the state share and the four requirements a qualifying state false claims act must meet). Minn. R. Civ. P. 3.01 (commencement by service); Minn. R. Civ. P. 12.01 (21-day answer). This article is general legal information about Minnesota law. It is not legal advice, it does not create an attorney–client relationship, and no outcome is promised or implied.