July 31, 2023
Whistleblower Law Collaborative Managing Member Suzanne Durrell has been elected a Fellow of the American Bar Foundation (ABF). Founded in 1952, the ABF Fellows are a global honorary society of attorneys, judges, law faculty, and legal scholars whose public and private careers have demonstrated outstanding dedication to the highest principles of the legal profession and to the welfare of their communities. The ABF is governed by a twenty-five-person Board of Directors comprised of distinguished leaders in the legal community.
Ms. Durrell’s career has focused on representing whistleblowers and the federal and state governments in fighting fraud in government programs such as health care.
Attorney Durrell was selected as a Fellow:
[I]n recognition of exemplary dedication to highest principles of the legal profession, commitment to the welfare of society, and support for the ideals, objectives, and work of the American Bar Foundation.
–American Bar Foundation
Suzanne Durrell co-founded the Whistleblower Law Collaborative (WLC) with Robert M. Thomas, Jr. to represent whistleblowers under the False Claims Act in 2003. Since then the firm has grown to six attorneys and two paralegals, and represents whistleblowers under a variety of whistleblower laws and programs. In 2017, Ms. Durrell and Mr. Thomas received the prestigious “Lawyer of the Year” award from Taxpayers Against Fraud Education Fund, a national public interest non-profit dedicated to combatting fraud against the government. In the past 20 years, WLC has helped the government recover over $6.8 billion. The firm has been involved in some of the largest settlements under the FCA. WLC has been named a Law360 Health Care Group of the Year, and Ms. Durrell has received numerous awards including a Top Woman of Law.
Prior to founding WLC, Ms. Durrell served as an Assistant U.S. Attorney and as Deputy Chief, and then Chief, Civil Division, U. S. Attorney’s Office, Boston from 1989 to 2002. In that role, she supervised and prosecuted qui tam and False Claims Act cases. She also served as Deputy Associate Attorney General at the U. S. Department of Justice in Washington, D.C. (DOJ) during 1991 and 1992. She was a national leader in developing strategies and policies for enforcing the False Claims Act. Attorney Durrell received numerous awards from DOJ and other federal agencies, including the Attorney General’s Award for Exceptional Service, the most prestigious recognition bestowed by DOJ.
Ms. Durrell is extremely honored to be chosen as an ABF Fellow. The ABF funds research that brings law and society together to advance justice. ABF’s research is looking for how to improve the ways in which attorneys learn and practice law. Not every attorney has the same experience–how can it be made better? The ABF encourages citizens that the law is there is to help them by purging out matters of injustice. What as a society can we do better as to matters of social injustice? The ABF’s research is used to shape law and policy so that existing policies can be better used to help the people.
She wholeheartedly supports the ABF’s mission to advance justice. As she said during Women’s History Month in 2021:
[W]hile you may not think of yourself as part of history, you are. We all are. And progress is achieved by each of us doing our part, in our time, to advance the cause of justice.
–Suzanne E. Durrell
Whistleblower Law Collaborative LLC, based in Boston, devotes its practice entirely to representing clients nationwide in bringing actions under the federal and state False Claims Acts and other whistleblower programs. Under the False Claims Act, a private citizen (known as a “relator”) who suspects or knows of fraud against the government can act as a whistleblower and file a sealed complaint on behalf of the government.
For more information, contact the Whistleblower Law Collaborative LLC at 617.366.2800.