In September 2012, the U.S. government intervened in a False Claims Act lawsuit alleging CH2M Hill employees overbilled the government for the number of hours they worked at the Department of Energy’s Hanford Nuclear Site, at which CH2M Hill was managing contractor from 1999 to 2008. The lawsuit was originally filed in 2009 by Carl Schroeder, who pleaded guilty in November 2011 to one count of conspiracy to defraud the government (see CH2M Hill Companies instance, “U.S. v. Schroeder (Hanford Time Card Fraud)”). In March 2013, CH2M Hill entered into a joint civil/criminal settlement, agreeing to pay $19 million ($16.55 million civil penalty; disgorgement of $1.95 million in profits; $500,000 to improve accountability systems at Hanford), enter into a three-year non-prosecution agreement, hire a corporate monitor, and cooperate with the government’s ongoing fraud investigation. CH2M Hill agreed to a statement of facts that it had committed federal criminal violations, including defrauding the government by encouraging employees to overstate the number of hours worked and submitting the falsified time cards to the Department of Energy.