Whistleblower Attorney Reflects on Career, Early Influences for Social Justice Passion

Boston University (BU) College of the Arts and Sciences recently profiled whistleblower attorney David Colapinto, partner at the qui tam law firm Kohn, Kohn & Colapinto (KKC).

Colapinto, who is a BU alum and co-founder of the National Whistleblower Center, has been representing whistleblowers for over thirty years.

Colapinto’s early days at BU, where he witnessed the labor strife that occurred between workers at the college and the university’s president at the time, John Silber, is where he formed his passion for social justice.

“It taught me a lot of lessons that were very useful later on, on how to approach complex problems and deal with the type of work I do now,” Colapinto said.

Recently, Colapinto was a featured commentator on several media outlets concerning the 2019 whistleblower complaint that led to the impeachment proceedings of President Donald Trump. One such feature was his appearance on C-Span’s “Washington Journal” to explain the laws behind the whistleblower’s rights to anonymity.

Colapinto has represented several high-profile whistleblowers in his career, including serving as co-counsel for IRS whistleblower Bradley Birkenfeld, the largest individual qui tam reward recipient in history. He also represented Frederic Whitehurst, the FBI whistleblower who suffered retaliation and whose disclosures led to significant reforms at the FBI Crime Lab.

Most recently, his client Alex Chepurko’s disclosures led to a $69.6 million judgment against the defendants in biofuels fraud False Claims Act case U.S. ex rel. Chepurko v. e-biofuels, LLP, et al.

Read the story from Boston University: On the Side of Whistleblowers – Alum David Colapinto’s defense of whistleblowers becomes more urgent in the Trump era.