In Janetos v. Fulton, Friedman & Gullace, plaintiff filed a putative class action alleging that defendant violated the FDCPA, and moved to certify the class.  Plaintiff alleged that defendant's initial letter failed to properly contain the required validation disclosures.  The court found that the class claims would be sufficiently related and based on the same general letter that permitted certification of a class of about 19,000 consumers.

 

In Isaac v. RMB, Inc., plaintiffs went to trial on their claims that defendant violated the FDCPA by continuing to call after receipt of a cease and desist letter, and left a message that failed to include the FDCPA disclosures.  At the bench trial, defendant argued that plaintiffs were not consumers under the FDCPA, and any violation was the result of a bona fide error.  The court found that plaintiffs were consumers even though they were not the debtor, because many calls were made to plaintiffs without disclosing the identity of the intended recipient of the calls and that the FDCPA would afford protection to non-debtors subjected to collection activity.  The court also refused to apply a bona fide error defense, because defendant had not taken adequate steps to prevent the automated system from calling numbers that had received a cease and desist request.  The court then awarded plaintiffs, who were pro se, $3,500 in statutory and actual damages.

 

In Miljkovic v. Shafritz, plaintiff alleged that the defendant violated the FDCPA by making several procedural errors in prosecuting the debt collection case.   In granting defendant's motion to dismiss, the court concluded that the FDCPA was not intended to create liability for procedural filings made in error in the course of litigation.

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