The Eleventh Circuit’s published decision in United States ex rel. Smith v. Odom, 2025 WL 2424425 (11th Cir. Aug. 22, 2025), affirms dismissal with prejudice under the False Claims Act’s public-disclosure bar and offers guidance on what counts as a public disclosure, what “substantially the same” really means, and when a relator qualifies as an “original source.”
Although the principles apply to any qui tam case, this case arose from allegations that an airport sponsor falsely certified compliance with FAA grant assurances after a single owner effectively controlled both fixed-base operators at the Destin Executive Airport. However, years before the qui tam was filed, local and industry press had already reported the consolidation and the potential grant-assurance violations in the news.
Key takeaways
- News articles can be enough—by themselves. The court held that media coverage identifying the government program (FAA grants), the certification requirements, and the core scheme (common ownership of both operators leading to exclusivity) qualified as a public disclosure.
- “Substantially the same” does not mean identical. It is sufficient that the complaint’s allegations “significantly overlap” the public reporting for the public-disclosure bar to apply. Even though the relator alleged facts concerning conduct occurring after the news articles were published, those allegations were insufficient to overcome the bar. The Court explained that those facts merely supplemented and contextualized the core fraud hypothesis, but the news articles had already supplied the essential fraud inference.
- “Materially adds” sets a high bar for relators. Background facts, contextual elaboration, or cumulative details do not transform a relator into an original source. To “materially add,” the relator must contribute non-public information that meaningfully advances the fraud theory beyond what the public disclosures already support. The Court explained: “It is not open season, in other words, for would-be relators who have one piece of a puzzle that is already largely complete.”
- Futility of amendment. Leave to amend was properly denied as futile where the relator offered to amend to add “additional detail regarding how he learned of the allegations.” The Court explained that independent knowledge is not enough, because the relator also has to materially add to the publicly disclosed allegations or transactions to qualify as an original source.
Why it matters
For defendants, Smith clarifies that “significant overlap” between prior news coverage and the complaint’s core fraud hypothesis is sufficient to apply the public-disclosure bar, even if the relator provides subsequent facts but those facts do not materially add to the publicly disclosed information.
For relators, the opinion is a caution: if the press has already connected the dots, you must either have disclosed to the government first or add genuinely transaction-advancing non-public facts—not mere context or after-the-fact echoes of the same theory.
