UnitedHealth's Surgical Care Affiliates fires back at DOJ in collusion case

Surgical Care Affiliates, which is part of UnitedHealth Group's Optum division, hit back at the Department of Justice's defense of a federal case accusing SCA of agreeing with competitors to not poach senior-level employees.

In a May 14 proposed reply brief supporting its bid to dismiss the case, SCA argued the Justice Department's defense is unlawful and violates due process rights.

"The government seeks to criminally prosecute as a per se Sherman Act violation an alleged agreement not to solicit another company's employees, even though no court in history has ever definitively found such an agreement unlawful under any mode of analysis," according to the proposed reply brief. "Not only is this kind of agreement not illegal per se, but subjecting a practice to per se condemnation for the first time in a criminal prosecution would violate bedrock guarantees of due process." [emphasis in original]

In January, a federal grand jury charged SCA and its related entities, which own and operate outpatient medical care centers, with entering and engaging in conspiracies with other healthcare companies to suppress competition between them for the services of senior-level employees. 

In an email statement to Becker's Hospital Review, SCA said at the time of the charges: "This matter involves alleged conduct seven years before UnitedHealth Group acquired SCA and does not involve any SCA ambulatory surgery centers, their joint owners, physician partners, current leadership or any other UnitedHealth Group companies. SCA disagrees with the government's position, and will vigorously defend itself against these unjustified allegations."

The charges are the first from the department's antitrust division in its ongoing investigation into employee allocation agreements. Violators of the Sherman Act can face a maximum $100 million fine, or twice the gain derived from the crime or twice the loss suffered by victims if the amount is greater than the maximum. 

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