Federal prosecutor’s office collects huge amount in 2015

The U.S. Attorney's Office here collected more than $16 million from civil and criminal cases this fiscal year, which may be the largest amount ever for the Northern District of Iowa.

Assistant U.S. Attorney Matt Cole said the office usually gets $3 million to $7 million each year; the $16,322,696 collected in the fiscal year that ended Sept. 30 is more than twice the office's direct budget.

Last year, the office collected more than $3.7 million.

The collections this year are the result of some major criminal and civil cases which required defendants to pay thousands or millions in victim restitution and fines.

Cole said all the money collected is returned to the federal treasury and victims of crimes.

The breakdown in 2015 was more than $8.6 million from criminal actions and more than $7.6 million from civil actions.

'The recovery of ill begotten funds for the federal treasury and for victims of crimes is a top priority,” U.S. Attorney Kevin Techau said in a statement. 'I am very proud of the office's efforts to hold accountable those who wrongfully profit at the expense of the United States.”

Cole pointed out this year's collections include some cases that were resolved in previous years.

The top criminal collection came from the case against Austin 'Jack” DeCoster, his son Peter DeCoster, and their company, Quality Egg LLC. In addition to both DeCosters being sentenced to prison time and being fined $100,000, their company was ordered to pay a fine of $6.79 million.

The top civil collection resulted from a settlement with ResCare Iowa Inc. The company agreed to pay $5.63 million to the federal government and the State of Iowa to resolve allegations that it violated the False Claims Act by submitting false home healthcare billings to the Medicare and Medicaid programs.

Nationally, the Department of Justice collected $23.1 billion in civil and criminal actions in fiscal year 2015. That is more than seven and a half times the $2.93 billion the department appropriated to the nation's 94 U.S. Attorneys' Offices and main litigating divisions in that same period.

The $23.1 billion includes all proceeds collected as a result of Justice Department-led enforcement actions and negotiated civil settlements. It includes more than $16.2 billion in payments made directly to the Justice Department, and more than $6.8 billion in indirect payments made to other federal agencies, states and other designated recipients.