Firm Profile

Kohn, Kohn & Colapinto, based in Washington, D.C., is the nation’s leading law firm for whistleblower protection. We stand up in court for those who speak out against unjust and illegal practices on the job. As experts in employee litigation, our attorneys focus on the many complex statutes that today are at issue in whistleblower cases, including the qui tam provision of the False Claims Act, which encourages workers to report government contract fraud. With clients from both the public and private sectors, we also pursue actions involving wrongful dismissal, the Dodd-Frank Act, which protects and rewards employees who report fraud in securities and commodities, and IRS tax whistleblower rewards.

KKC has a strong international reputation and its attorneys have made presentations to leading government officials and whistleblower organizations throughout the world, including such countries as Hungary, Bosnia, Serbia, Czech Republic, Israel and South Korea. The firm represents clients using the Foreign Corrupt Practices Act and other whistleblower laws from countries as diverse as Switzerland and Russia.

Founded in 1988, KKC has won numerous landmark decisions, rewriting workplace law while earning millions of dollars in damages for our clients. The firm has successfully litigated a series of prominent cases, generating widespread recognition via the national press. Meanwhile, our volunteer efforts on behalf of lesser-known whistleblowers and the crucial role they play in a free society have earned us the respect of our legal peers. The attorneys at KKC support all those who serve the larger good by revealing work-related assaults on the nation’s health and defense, from government malfeasance to the corporate disregard for nuclear and environmental regulations.

KK&C and each of its partners have an "AV®" rating from the Martindale-Hubbell® Bar Register of Preeminent Lawyers.TM This rating is based on a peer review survey conducted by Martindale-Hubbell.


* * * *

Our achievements include:

  • Represented the largest tax whistleblower in history whose disclosure enabled over $5 billion to be recovered by the U.S. Treasury.
  • Successfully represented leading bank whistleblower, in 2012, concerning foreclosure-abuses that fueled the financial "meltdown" and forced millions of Americans out of their homes.
  • Achieved a major victory and settlement for top civil contracting officer at the US Army Corps of Engineers who blew the whistle on multi-million contracting fraud in the war with Iraq.
  • Represented leading whistleblower in $515 million fraud recovery through the false claims act from Bristol Myers Squib.
  • Represented whistleblower whose disclosures forced UBS to be fined $750 million by the Security Exchange Commission and the Internal Revenue Service.
  • Provided pro bono legal services to draft rule proposal to SEC for the Dodd-Frank whistleblower program. The proposal was adopted by the Commission and included critical protections for compliance officers and for whistleblowers; even those that participate in fraud are still eligible for rewards.
  • The firm’s partners authored the leading handbooks and textbooks in whistleblower law.
  • Challenging government contract fraud across the United States.
  • Holding contractors accountable by recovering over half a billion dollars for taxpayers and compelling criminal prosecution of unscrupulous companies.
  • Working with Congress to pass critical whistleblower laws, including the No-FEAR Act, the Sarbanes-Oxley Act, the consumer product safety act,  adding whistleblower protections into the stimulus laws,  and the Civil Rights Tax Relief Act.
  • Leading the effort to ban "hush money" payments in federal cases involving environmental and nuclear violations.
  • Setting national precedent permitting federal employees to speak publicly and criticize their employing agencies.
  • Revealing vulnerabilities at U.S. nuclear power plants to airborne terrorist attack and forcing reforms within the U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission.
  • Creating precedent permitting federal employees to use the "mixed case" theory in order to obtain the right to trial by jury on their merit systems protection board claims
  • Findings government doctors protected under the whistleblower protection act
  • Pushing to win reinstatement for the country's highest-ranking nuclear
    whistleblower.
  • Forcing the recall of thousands of unsafe bullet proof vests sold to law enforcement and members of the u.s. military
  • Helping to block President George W. Bush's nominee for a top enforcement post at the EPA, a state regulator who had punished an employee for investigating a cancer cluster.
  • Documenting deficiencies in the FBI's counterterrorism program and misconduct in its investigations at the World Trade Center site after 9/11.
  • Forcing the FBI to improve and accredit its crime lab.
  • Establishing precedents under the first amendment, state common law and numerous federal statutes, recognizing and expanding whistleblower protection.
  • Vindicating whistleblowers before juries, judges and the public.
  • Winning the first-ever "hostile work environment" whistleblower retaliation case