A South Carolina-based healthcare system agreed to pay $36.5 million as part of a settlement with the Department of Justice (DOJ) addressing alleged violations of the False Claims Act (FCA), Stark Law, and Anti-Kickback Statute.

St. Francis Physician Services, St. Francis Hospital, and Bon Secours St. Francis Health System agreed to resolve allegations they paid orthopedic surgeons based on the volume or value of referrals, leading to false claims submitted to Medicare and TRICARE, the DOJ said in a press release Thursday.

The settlement resolves a lawsuit initially brought by Daniel Lee, chief of orthopedics at St. Francis from 2007-08, under the FCA’s qui tam provisions. According to the complaint, filed in U.S. District Court for the District of South Carolina, Lee blew the whistle on St. Francis after documenting Stark Law violations, including “payments to employed orthopedic surgeons based in part on the value of their referrals to the hospital system.”