Wick Sollers

Representative Experience

Healthcare and FDA Practice:

• Mr. Sollers represented the Product Manager of Fresinius/NMC who was indicted on 17 felonies by a federal grand jury in Boston, Massachusetts. Mr. Sollers ultimately convinced the U.S. Attorney’s Office to dismiss the case in its entirety and the client was fully exonerated.
  
  
• Mr. Sollers is currently representing an international pharmaceutical company in an off-label criminal and civil investigation being conducted by the Boston U.S. Attorney’s Office and a U.S. pharmaceutical company being investigated for alleged off-label promotion and violations of the anti-kickback statute by the U.S. Attorney’s Office in Baltimore.
  
  
• Mr. Sollers obtained a declination in 2008 from the U.S. Attorney’s office in the Central District of California for a major pharmaceutical company being investigated for alleged violations of the False Claims Act, including potential off-label promotion, as well as alleged violations of the anti-kickback statute.
  
  
• Mr. Sollers has represented several healthcare regulatory partners at a prominent DC law firm before the grand jury, in U.S. Attorney’s Office interviews and during their appearance at trial as witnesses in the TAP Pharmaceutical case in Boston.
  
  
• Mr. Sollers has successfully obtained several other declinations from the U.S. Attorney’s Office in Boston in significant healthcare investigations.
  
  
• Mr. Sollers represented a large HMO in a False Claims Act investigation and a publicly traded biotech company in an investigation for off-label promotion and related issues by the U.S. Attorney’s Office in Philadelphia and the Connecticut Attorney General’s Office. He has also represented a number of non-target corporate executives before the USAO in Philadelphia.
  
  
• Mr. Sollers has obtained declinations on several criminal investigations, conducted by the Department of Justice, Office of Consumer Litigation, of alleged false filings by corporations with the FDA.
  
  
• Mr. Sollers represented Jazz Pharmaceuticals in a federal criminal/civil investigation conducted by the U.S. Attorney’s Office in the E.D.N.Y. into off-label promotion, a case that was settled favorably in June 2007.
  
  
• Mr. Sollers, along with his former partner, Larry Thompson, represented a major healthcare provider in a fraud investigation being conducted by the New York Attorney General’s Office. That matter was successfully resolved.
  
  
• Mr. Sollers represented GlaxoSmithKline in a consumer fraud lawsuit announced by the New York Attorney General’s Office on June 2, 2004, and resolved favorably in August of 2004.
  
  
• Along with Judge Griffin Bell, Mr. Sollers represented the outside Board of Directors of Beverly Enterprises in a federal criminal investigation in San Francisco into false claims by the nursing home chain.
  
  
• Mr. Sollers has conducted numerous internal investigations and counseled healthcare and FDA clients on a variety of disclosure and governance issues.

• Mr. Sollers argued Leocal v. Ashcroft before the United States Supreme Court, challenging the scope of a federal criminal statute that defines “crimes of violence” for which a lawful permanent resident may be removed from the United States. The Court, in an opinion authored by Chief Justice Rehnquist, issued an unanimous 9-0 decision, reversing the Eleventh Circuit, in a complete victory for Mr. Sollers’ client.
  
  
• Mr. Sollers, along with his partner Steve Cowen, obtained the full acquittal of their client, the former Controller of Qwest, in a nine-week highly-publicized trial in federal court in Denver, Colorado. The acquittal was the first in a high-profile case of this nature since the Enron scandal broke.
  
  
• Mr. Sollers obtained an acquittal in a six-week trial in federal court in Maryland on three of four counts charging an executive of a medical device manufacturer with fraud in the filing of 510(k) applications with the FDA. The remaining false statement count, on which the defendant was convicted, was overturned by the United States Court of Appeals for the Fourth Circuit after Mr. Sollers argued the case in December 2001. The case was ultimately dismissed with prejudice by the U.S. Attorney’s Office and the client fully exonerated.
  
  
• In 1985, Mr. Sollers was appointed Assistant United States Attorney for the District of Maryland where he prosecuted cases involving narcotics, contract murder-for-hire, bank robbery, savings and loan fraud, and other white collar crimes, in addition to the first federal environmental case tried in that district. His experience at the United States Attorney’s office included over 15 federal criminal jury trials and six arguments before the Fourth Circuit Court of Appeals.

Government Investigations Practice:

• Along with Judge Griffin Bell, Mr. Sollers represented former President George H.W. Bush in the Iran-Contra and Clinton Passport Independent Counsel investigations.
  
  
• Also with Judge Bell, Mr. Sollers led publicly disclosed internal investigations into the FBI’s Office of Professional Responsibility (OPR) at FBI Director Mueller’s request; and the Statue of Liberty Foundation at the request of its Board of Directors. 
  
  
• Along with his former partner Larry Thompson, Mr. Sollers represented Lockheed Corporation in the investigation and settlement of allegations of violations of the Foreign Corrupt Practices Act (FCPA) as a result of payments made by Lockheed to a member of the Egyptian Parliament.  Mr. Sollers has conducted numerous FCPA internal investigations and regularly counsels clients on FCPA compliance.
  
  
• Mr. Sollers counsels clients on preventive measures to allow them to avoid litigation and government investigations.  He has worked with numerous companies to create and refine compliance programs that conform to the U.S. Sentencing Guidelines for Organizations.
  
  
• During 1988-1989, Mr. Sollers was Special Counsel to the United States Senate Committee on Investigations, a broad-based investigation into fraud in American Indian programs.  He conducted televised hearings at the conclusion of this investigation.