Barrday: Allegedly Weaving Zylon Fabric After Learning of Degradation
Barrday agreed to pay more than $1 million to resolve False Claims Act allegations over weaving Zylon fabric after learning of degradation. The government alleged that the material quickly lost its ability to stop bullets, especially in heat and humidity, yet Barrday continued supplying it for body armor after learning of the problem.
What Barrday Supplied
Barrday was a weaver of ballistic fabrics headquartered in Cambridge, Ontario, Canada. It also designed and produced specialty industrial textiles. In this case, the Justice Department alleged that its woven Zylon fabric went into bulletproof vests sold by Second Chance Body Armor, Point Blank Body Armor and Gator Hawk Armor.
That places Barrday inside the product, upstream of the companies selling the finished vests. The alleged defect traveled from a fabric supplier into protective equipment bought for law enforcement. A purchasing office looking at the vest maker’s name would be looking at only one business in that chain.
The government’s money reached the vests through different routes. The United States bought vests directly. State, local and tribal law-enforcement agencies also bought them and received partial reimbursement through a Justice Department program.
The department placing an order and the government helping pay for it can be different institutions. We follow both the sale and the reimbursement when examining how a defective product reached a publicly funded buyer.
The Warning Came Before the Last Sale
The Justice Department reported that Barrday knew of Zylon’s defective nature by at least December 2001, but continued selling it for ballistic armor until approximately 2003.
In 2003, two police officers were shot through their Second Chance Zylon vests. That year, Barrday became the first weaver to withdraw permanently from the Zylon market.
We see the absurdity in that sequence: the government alleged that Barrday kept selling fabric for protection after learning that its protection was failing. The sales continued anyway.
Why the Fabric Supplier Mattered to the Government’s Case
The Barrday settlement concerned a component supplier’s alleged knowledge of defects in material that reached government-funded products. In explaining the case, the Justice Department expressly focused on suppliers distributing components while knowing of hidden defects. Its investigation reached the weaver as well as businesses farther down the chain.
That is the practical significance of nonconforming goods in government purchases. The contract buys specified performance. The government alleged a failure in that material’s continuing ability to stop bullets.
We examine those connections together. A material warning can explain why a later shipment matters, while a customer order can connect that shipment to the product sold. This is where knowledge inside a supplier can give meaning to records held elsewhere in the purchasing chain.
The Barrday Settlement and Cooperation
The Justice Department announced the Barrday settlement on January 23, 2009. The payment agreement resolved allegations about the weaving of Zylon fabric used in defective bulletproof vests. Barrday also pledged cooperation with the government’s continuing investigation of the body-armor industry’s use of Zylon.
Investigators included the Justice Department’s Civil Division, the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the District of Columbia, the General Services Administration Office of the Inspector General and the Department of Homeland Security Office of Inspector General.
For insiders considering a case about defective government purchases, the whistleblower reward is a share of the government’s recovery. A whistleblower case under the False Claims Act can pay 15% to 30% of what the government recovers.
The Same Material, Different Supply Decisions
Lincoln Fabrics agreed to a separate $4 million settlement over its Zylon fabric supply. The government alleged that Lincoln knew of degradation by December 2001 but continued supplying fabric through August 2005. Its alleged supply period extended beyond Barrday’s withdrawal.
Farther upstream, fiber manufacturer Toyobo agreed to a separate $66 million settlement. The government alleged that Toyobo supplied misleading degradation data and encouraged continued vest sales after a recall. Its alleged role involved the information used to keep the product moving as well as the material itself. A former Second Chance employee brought a qui tam case, and the government joined it. The announced whistleblower award was $5.8 million.
The Justice Department reported that over half of the used vests in the National Institute of Justice’s August 2005 study failed to stop bullets they had been certified to stop. The institute decertified Zylon vests that month. The later testing gives the degradation warnings their practical meaning: protective equipment already in use could fail at the very job it had been certified to do.
By the time of Toyobo’s agreement, the Justice Department reported more than $132 million recovered across the Zylon industry. These were separate settlements at different points in the supply chain. The question running through them is the same: who understood the degradation problem, and what did that business continue providing?
What Proof Do You Need as a Whistleblower?
We connect material warnings, later deliveries and the purchases the government funded. In a defective-body-armor matter, we examine what the company learned about performance alongside what it continued selling and what it told its customers. A test result and a sales assurance may tell different stories about the same material.
A person familiar with testing may understand a warning that looks obscure to a purchasing employee. Someone handling customer orders may know which vest maker received the fabric. The billing and payment records connect the product to the purchase. Those are different views of the same transaction, and we work with insiders to connect them.
Agency review and acceptance record the performance decision. Payment records show the disbursement, so they tell us what the government actually paid. We read those commercial records alongside the performance information an insider understands, so the account of what shipped stays connected to what the buyer was told.
You Know What the Fabric Was Supposed to Do
If you saw degradation warnings while fabric kept shipping for protective equipment, speak to one of our Whistleblower Experts about what the supplier knew. We build the case around your knowledge of the material and the sales, bring in government procurement whistleblower lawyers who understand defective-product claims, and stay beside you throughout the case.
