Export Compliance Daily is a Warren News publication.

Self-Proclaimed ‘TCPA Robin Hood’ Sues to Stop Mortgage Firm’s Junk Cold Calls

Network Capital Funding is engaged in a scheme to sell mortgage refinance services via cold calls to residential phone numbers listed on the "protected" federal do not call registry, alleged a class action Tuesday (docket 8:24-cv-01335) in U.S. District Court…

Sign up for a free preview to unlock the rest of this article

Export Compliance Daily combines U.S. export control news, foreign border import regulation and policy developments into a single daily information service that reliably informs its trade professional readers about important current issues affecting their operations.

for Central California. Network Capital’s illegal telemarketing calls are prohibited by the Telephone Consumer Protection Act, “which gives victims of junk calls a private right of action to sue for the intrusion on their privacy,” said Paul Sapan’s complaint. Network Capital’s “modus operandi is the same for all the calls in this case,” it said. It either directly or through an agent calls “massive lists of phone numbers” in the U.S. to sell its services without regard to whether those numbers are listed on the national DNC registry, it said. Network Capital or its agents don’t check the DNC registry before making these calls, nor do they engage in any other DNC registry compliance, it said. Network Capital has intentionally violated the TCPA “in a so-far successful attempt to sell financial and/or mortgage packages for years,” it said. Sapan alleges that Network Capital made at least 15 calls to his residential phone number, though that number has been listed continuously on the national DNC registry since December 2007, said the complaint. The Orange County, California resident, never gave Network Capital or any of its agents his express written permission to call him, nor does he have an established business or personal relationship with the company or any of its agents and employees, the complaint said. Past defendants have accused the plaintiff of being one of the “most prolific TCPA litigants in the country,” but Sapan defends himself as a “TCPA Robin Hood” who sues "junk callers" for their illegal calls, “then gives his portion of the recovery to charity” (see 2308310039).