Olympus Corporation of the Americas (OCA), a distributor of endoscopes and related equipment and a wholly-owned subsidiary of Japan-based Olympus, will pay $623.2 million to the government to resolve criminal charges and civil claims relating to a scheme to pay kickbacks to doctors and hospitals—the largest total amount paid in U.S. history for violations involving the Anti-Kickback Statute by a medical device company.

Jaclyn Jaeger is a freelance contributor to Compliance Week after working for the company for 15 years. She writes on a wide variety of topics, including ethics and compliance, risk management, legal,...