Jake M. Shields

Jake M. Shields is a partner in the Washington, D.C. office and a member of the firm’s False Claims Act, FDA & Heath Care, Life Sciences, Cybersecurity, Government Contracts, Antitrust, Litigation, and White-Collar Defense and Investigations Practice Groups.

An expert in the False Claims Act (FCA) and the Financial Institutions Reform, Recovery, & Enforcement Act (FIRREA), Jake was a Senior Trial Counsel at the Civil Frauds Section of the U.S. Department of Justice where, over an eight-year career spanning administrations of both major political parties, he investigated and litigated FCA and FIRREA cases on behalf of the federal government.

Both in and out of government, Jake has extensive experience handling matters involving allegations of healthcare, financial, customs, and procurement fraud, as well as violations of the Anti-Kickback Statute (AKS), Stark Law, Tariff Act, Payroll Protection Program, and restrictions on the off-label marketing of prescription drugs. During his time at DOJ, Jake was involved in dozens of FCA matters that collectively resulted in the recovery of hundreds of millions of dollars to the federal government, including respectively the single largest civil and FCA recoveries in the history of two separate federal jurisdictions (Houston and Nashville).

With a truly national practice, Jake has worked on FCA cases with more than two dozen U.S. Attorney’s Offices, including those in New York, Boston, Philadelphia, Los Angeles, Chicago, Brooklyn, Newark, Baltimore, Miami, Tampa, Houston, Dallas, Minneapolis, Milwaukee, Cincinnati, Atlanta, Nashville, Charlotte, New Orleans, Columbia, Savannah, Seattle, Sacramento, Las Vegas, Wilmington, and Washington D.C.

Jake has also worked with government agencies on FCA cases, including the Offices of Inspector General (OIG) and Offices of General Counsel (OGC) at the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) and its sub-agencies the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS) and Food & Drug Administration (FDA), Department of Defense (DoD) and its service branches (Army, Navy, & Air Force) and sub-agency the Defense Advanced Research Project Agency (DARPA), Department of Homeland Security (DHS) and its sub-agencies Customs and Border Protection (CBP) and the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA), Department of Commerce, Department of Treasury, National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA), and Small Business Administration (SBA).

Jake is an expert in federal cybersecurity enforcement against government contractors having served as lead counsel in the first FCA litigation that the United States ever filed against a contractor for alleged cybersecurity violations pursuant to DOJ’s Civil Cyber-Fraud Initiative [U.S. ex rel. Craig v. Georgia Tech Research Corp, No. 1:22-cv-02698 (N.D. Ga.)], as well as several other cybersecurity matters on behalf of the government.

Jake is also experienced in FCA enforcement against private equity and other investment firms, having worked on these matters in the government and helped hone DOJ’s enforcement efforts in this area.

In addition to his investigations work, Jake has served as lead counsel in multiple FCA litigations, including a major AKS case that resolved a number of novel legal issues regarding the scope of discovery of the government in FCA cases.

A thought leader in the area of FCA enforcement, Jake has written about the federal government’s AKS enforcement efforts under the FCA for DOJ’s Journal of Federal Law & Practice. Additionally, in 2024, Jake served as the Public Sector Chair of the Federal Bar Association’s annual Qui Tam Conference, which was titled “The Government and FCA Practice.”

In addition to his work at DOJ’s Civil Frauds Section, Jake spent a year on detail to DOJ’s Antitrust Division where he served as a member of the litigation team in the Google search antitrust enforcement action.

Prior to joining the Justice Department, Jake spent twelve years in private practice at two prominent international law firms in New York and Washington D.C. where his practice focused on complex civil and financial litigation at the trial and appellate levels. During this period, Jake litigated cases in both federal and state courts across the country, and argued appeals in the Second and Eighth Circuits, as well as state appellate courts in New York and Maryland.

Jake received his J.D. from the University of Virginia School of Law in 2003, where he served on the editorial board of the Virginia Law Review. He graduated from Dartmouth College in 1999 with an A.B. in Government. Following law school, Jake clerked for the Honorable Emilio M. Garza on the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit.

Capabilities

• White Collar Defense and Investigations
• Antitrust and Competition
• FDA and Health Care
• False Claims Act / Qui Tam Defense
• Government Contracts
• Life Sciences
• Litigation
• Privacy, Cybersecurity, and Data Innovation

Credentials

Admissions:

• District of Columbia Bar
• New York Bar