Defense contractor Lockheed Martin has agreed to pay the U.S. government $2 million to settle charges that it acted with others in knowingly violating the False Claims Act by rigging a contract at Stennis Space Center in Mississippi.

According to the Department of Justice, the 2009 whistleblower lawsuit accused Lockheed of conspiring with former federal employees Stephen Adamec and Robert Knesel and Haskin Dale Galloway, Science Applications International Corporation (SAIC) and Applied Enterprise Solutions (AES) in sharing private information that helped Lockheed and its partner companies win a $115 million contract. The contract was to provide support services for the National Center for Critical Information Processing and Storage (NCCIPS) at the Naval Oceanographic Major Shared Resource Center (NAVO MSRC) at Stennis.

The lawsuit alleged that Adamec and Knesel, a former director and a deputy director of NAVO MSRC, provided secret information about the bidding process while Galloway, who headed AES, helped steer the contract to SAIC.

Lockheed got $2 million for its portion of the contract.

Companies that do business with the federal government and get paid by the taxpayers must act fairly and comply with the law, Tony West, assistant attorney general for the Justice Department's civil division, said in a statement.

Government employee David Magee will receive $560,000 for his role in bringing the case to the attention of the authorities, the Justice Department said.

SEC Settlement Department of justice Attorney general