Iron Mountain to pay $44.5M to settle charges of falsely billing US for document, data storage

Information storage and management company Iron Mountain agreed to pay $44.5 million to settle allegations that the company overcharged federal agencies for record storage services, authorities announced Friday.

U.S. Attorney Benjamin B. Wagner said the settlement involves services the Boston-based company provided to government entities from 2001 to 2014 through contracts with the General Services Administration, or GSA.

Prosecutors say the settlement resolves allegations that Iron Mountain Inc. failed to provide GSA with accurate information about its commercial sales practices during contract negotiations, it didn't offer lower prices to government customers during its performance of the contracts and it charged the federal government for storage that didn't meet National Archives and Records Administration requirements.

The whistleblower action was filed under the False Claims Act in the Eastern District of California in Sacramento by Patrick McKillop and Brent Stanley.

McKillop, a former U.S. Marine who served in Vietnam, is currently an executive in the records management industry. Relator Brent Stanley is a former Iron Mountain executive who is now an entrepreneur also working in the information management sector, said their attorney, Paul D. Scott.

They will share $8 million from the settlement.

"Mr. McKillop and Mr. Stanley are both extremely gratified by the resolution of the case and are pleased that the United States Government will also be saving very substantial sums in the future as a result of adjustments to the ongoing pricing in Iron Mountain's GSA contracts," Scott said.

Iron Mountain said in a statement it had reported pricing issues to the GSA before the civil complaint was filed and that it has cooperated with the Department of Justice to reach a resolution.

"We are pleased to have reached this resolution and put the matter behind us, and we look forward to continuing to support our Federal government customers," said Ernest Cloutier, the company's Executive Vice President of U.S. Federal, Security and Legal.