Nationwide lender Speedy Cash engaged in “abusive and outrageous conduct” in connection with its debt collection activity, contacting Joshua Padilla more than 25 times using an automated or prerecorded voice “after receiving notice of attorney representation,” alleged Padilla’s Telephone Consumer Protection Act complaint Wednesday (docket 2:24-cv-04959) in U.S. District Court for Central California. The California resident’s complaint also alleges violations of California’s Rosenthal Fair Debt Collection Practices Act. The TCPA was designed to prevent calls like those that Speedy placed to Padilla, said the complaint: “By enacting the TCPA, Congress intended to give consumers a choice as to how corporate entities may contact them and to prevent the nuisance associated with automated or prerecorded calls.” Padilla took out a loan from Speedy in September, primarily for personal, family or household purposes, said the complaint. He eventually became financially unable to repay the loan in full, and subsequently retained counsel to assist in dealing with Speedy’s account “and to seek some type of financial relief,” it said. The plaintiff’s counsel sent Speedy a letter in October confirming representation and informing Speedy that it was to no longer contact Padilla directly, it said. The letter also informed Speedy that Padilla was withdrawing his consent to be contacted on his cellphone, it said. Speedy nevertheless “continued to call and otherwise contact” Padilla, it said. The calls were “frequent in nature,” it said.

Ruben Escano seeks to recover statutory damages for DirecTV’s automatically dialed and unsolicited telemarketing calls, and to enjoin such future calls, said his Telephone Consumer Protection Act complaint May 9 in the 6th Judicial District Court in Grant County, New Mexico, removed Wednesday (docket 2:24-cv-00594) to U.S. District Court for New Mexico in Las Cruces. The Silver City, New Mexico, resident, also alleges that DirecTV’s calls violated the New Mexico Unfair Practices Act. DirecTV placed at least eight unsolicited calls to Escano’s cellphone, though his number has been listed on the national do not call registry for more than a decade, said his complaint. The DNC registry “is available to telemarketers wishing to operate within the law,” it said. The calls resulted in voice mails being left on Escano’s cellphone, it said. All the voice mails “were made with a prerecorded message with the same script,” it said. The calls trumpeted an offer of 50% off an existing DirecTV subscription, but the plaintiff never had a DirecTV account, said the complaint. Escano alleges that DirecTV is at least vicariously liable for the calls at issue because the defendant engaged with an agent to place the calls, it said. Escano reserves the right to add that agent as a party, if discovery reveals that DirecTV used an agent, it said. DirecTV’s telemarketing operation used “predictive dialer technology,” said the complaint. A predictive dialer is a type of automatic telephone dialing system that predicts the maximum number of phone subscribers that can be called at once “in order for the call to be answered within a set period of time by a live phone representative,” it said. The calls caused the plaintiff “concrete injuries in fact,” said the complaint. They aggravated him, disrupted his days, “and required him to divert attention away from his work and personal life to tend to and answer such unwarranted intrusions of his time,” it said. DirecTV denies all of Escano’s allegations, said its notice of removal. DirecTV doesn’t waive “any claims, rights, defenses, or objections, including, without limitation, any challenges to personal jurisdiction, process, or service of process, or motion to compel arbitration,” it said.

Attorneys for plaintiff Thomas Gebka and defendant State Farm conferred via videoconference May 30 about all issues Gebka raised in a May 20 motion to compel discovery (see 2405210004), the parties’ joint status report said Tuesday (docket 1:22-cv-05546) in U.S. District Court for Northern Illinois in Chicago. Gebka’s motion seeks production of all records and notes for all calls that State Farm or any State Farm agency made from Oct. 10, 2018, to the present. Gebka’s October 2022 Telephone Consumer Protection Act class action alleges that State Farm “engaged in a national telemarketing campaign to promote its insurance via unsolicited calls to persons who had no prior relationship” with the insurer (see 2210110009). During the May 30 conferral, State Farm claimed for the first time that experts within the company “advised they may not be able to export the data for the call records and notes from the database tables in which State Farm stores it without crashing the system,” Gebka’s position statement in the joint status report said. However, Gebka “contends" it "is routine to export the data,” and proposed State Farm allow Gebka’s expert to do so himself, “which counsel for State Farm stated he knows State Farm will not allow,” it said. Gebka contends that it’s clear State Farm “is not conferring in good faith but is instead attempting to weaponize” the court’s standing order to delay, it said. State Farm’s “impression” is that Gebka “would like to speed through the conferral process and then renew his motion to compel,” said its position statement in the joint status report. During the May 30 conferral, Gebka “rejected all of State Farm’s proposals,” it said. The scope of Gebka’s discovery demands is “enormous” and “contrary” to the court’s Nov. 2023 order cautioning that the plaintiff’s discovery requests need to be “appropriately narrowed” at this stage of the case, the report said. State Farm has produced reports showing that since 2018 -- the beginning of Gebka’s alleged class period -- internet lead vendors EverQuote, ZipQuote and QuoteWizard have sold more than 40 million leads to more than 12,000 State Farm agents, it said. From additional reports that State Farm has produced, “it can be estimated” that there are more than a billion call records for those 12,000 agents, it said. State Farm contends that Gebka has now walked back his earlier positions and is demanding “even broader discovery,” it said. Moreover, it assumes Gebka is demanding such broad information “to engage in a fishing expedition for an alternative theory,” it said.

Yazmin Gonzalez began receiving “a barrage of illegal telemarketing calls” in December made on behalf of Liberty Bankers Life Insurance by “an unknown anonymous telemarketer” soliciting Liberty’s insurance policies, alleged her Telephone Consumer Protection Act complaint Tuesday (docket 3:24-cv-00201) in U.S. District Court for Western Texas in El Paso. The pro se plaintiff “seeks redress under the TCPA, demanding that the calls stop,” it said. Liberty appointed Muhammad Baloch, a licensed insurance agent and a nonparty to the suit, “with the knowledge and expectation that Baloch would make phone calls to solicit Liberty’s products and services,” said the complaint. Liberty had the responsibility to ensure that the agents it appointed and authorized to solicit its products “obeyed federal and state consumer protection laws,” it said. Gonzalez received at least 12 calls between Dec. 8 and May 6 from a variety of spoofed phone numbers from telemarketers and direct Liberty employees soliciting life insurance on the defendant's behalf, though the Texas resident personally listed her cellphone number on the national do not call registry in March 2022, it said. Liberty “knew or should have known the requirements for making TCPA-compliant telemarketing calls and thus knew or should have known that the calls complained of herein violate the TCPA and its regulations,” said the complaint. The company also is “is well aware of the regulations regarding the TCPA and the ethical prohibition surrounding unsolicited direct advertising to consumers with whom no preexisting relationship exists,” it said. Liberty is vicariously liable under “federal common law principles of agency” for TCPA violations committed by third-party telemarketers, it said.

Shoes for Crews, a shoe retailer and manufacturer, promotes its products by engaging in aggressive unsolicited marketing, “harming thousands of consumers in the process,” alleged Micah DeClerk’s Telephone Consumer Protection Act class action Tuesday (docket 9:24-cv-80732) in U.S. District Court for Southern Florida. Shoes for Crews uses “aggressive marketing to push its products without regards to consumers’ rights under the TCPA," said DeClerk’s complaint. The Pulaski County, Arkansas, resident seeks injunctive relief to halt the defendant’s illegal conduct, “which has resulted in the invasion of privacy, harassment, aggravation, and disruption of the daily life of thousands of individuals,” it said. She also seeks statutory damages on behalf of herself and members of the class, “and any other available legal or equitable remedies,” it said. In late 2023, Shoes for Crews began “bombarding” DeClerk with telemarketing text messages to her cellphone number, though the plaintiff personally listed her number on the national do not call registry in September, said the complaint. At no point in time did DeClerk provide Shoes for Crews with her express written consent to be contacted, it said. The plaintiff also has no existing business relationship with the defendant, it said. The defendant’s unsolicited text messages caused DeClerk “actual harm,” said the complaint. The defendant’s text messages also inconvenienced her and caused disruption to her daily life, it said. DeClerk estimates that she has wasted 15-30 seconds reviewing each of the defendant’s unwanted messages, it said. Each time, DeClerk had to stop what she was doing to either retrieve her phone or look down at the phone to review the message, it said.

Oak Street Health operates primary care centers serving Medicare-eligible patients, and one of its strategies for luring new patients is telemarketing via “unsolicited cold calls,” alleged Kimberly Starling’s Telephone Consumer Protection Act class action Monday (docket 1:24-cv-04782) in U.S. District Court for Northern Illinois in Chicago. Because Medicare is generally reserved to individuals 65 and older, Oak Street “targets one of America’s most vulnerable populations -- its senior citizens,” said the Southlake, Texas, resident’s complaint. Many of these calls are made to individuals who listed their phone numbers on the national do not call registry because they didn’t want to receive “these types of telemarketing calls,” it said. The plaintiff listed her residential phone number on the national DNC registry in May 2021, yet she began receiving Oak Street’s telemarketing cold calls in October 2023, said her complaint. Despite Starling’s demand that Oak Street stop phoning her, she received multiple more calls from the company, including two calls Jan. 29 that were roughly 90 minutes apart, it said. Upon information and belief, the defendant uses telemarketing “fronters” to cold-call individuals and identify potential Medicare members eligible for its services as a part of its advertising efforts, it said. The plaintiff didn’t provide “prior express invitation or permission or consent” for Oak Street’s calls, it said. The company’s TCPA violations were negligent, or alternatively, they were willful and knowing, in which case she seeks treble damages of $1,500 for each infraction, it said. Starling and the class members were damaged by the violations because their privacy was “improperly invaded,” and Oak Street’s calls “temporarily seized and trespassed upon the use of their phones and phone lines,” it said.

American Express National Bank unlawfully tried collecting a debt from William Burdette by placing a high volume of calls to his cellphone using an artificial or prerecorded voice, his Telephone Consumer Protection Act complaint alleged Sunday (docket 3:24-cv-01010) in U.S. District Court for Southern California in San Diego. Burdette also alleges American Express violated his privacy and caused him damages in violation of California’s Rosenthal Fair Debt Collection Protections Act. The California legislature’s “explicit purpose” of enacting that statute “was to prohibit debt collectors from engaging in unfair or deceptive acts or practices in the collection of consumer debts and to require debtors to act fairly in entering into and honoring such debts,” the complaint said. The San Diego County resident opened an American Express credit card account in December 2016 and maintained it in good standing until May 2023, when he fell into financial hardship and was unable to keep up with monthly payments, the complaint said. Once the account went into default, American Express used a prerecorded voice to phone Burdette's cellphone multiple times requesting payment, “often as many as twice per day, sometimes every day,” it said. Burdette alleges the company has phoned at least 130 times since July 2023, “based on his recollection of the frequency of calls, as well as the records of calls that he has in his possession,” the complaint said. He alleges negligent breaches of the TCPA, and seeks treble damages for knowing and willful violations of the statute.

SiriusXM “routinely violates” the Telephone Consumer Protection Act when it uses an artificial or prerecorded voice to place nonemergency calls to cellphone numbers without the recipients’ prior express consent, Micah Scott’s class action Friday (docket 5:24-cv-00737) in U.S. District Court for Northern Alabama alleged. The Huntsville, Alabama, resident alleges the defendant phoned him at least five times to collect a debt on a newly renewed subscription, though he never had a business relationship with the company, nor was he a SiriusXM subscriber, the complaint said. Scott “suffered actual harm as a result of the subject artificial or prerecorded voice messages in that he suffered an invasion of privacy, an intrusion into his life, and a private nuisance,” his complaint said.

Brinker International inundates consumers’ cellphones with telemarketing text-message solicitations, and contacts numbers listed on the national and Massachusetts do not call registries, Paul Jones’ Telephone Consumer Protection Act complaint May 3 in Hampden County Superior Court alleged. It was removed Friday (docket 3:24-cv-30078) to U.S. District Court for Massachusetts in Springfield. Brinker, parent company of Chili's Grill & Bar, Romano's Macaroni Grill and Maggiano's Little Italy, denies Jones’ claims, and denies he “is entitled to any relief,” its notice of removal said. The plaintiff also alleges violations of the Massachusetts Telemarketing Solicitation Act. Brinker’s strategies for generating new business involve using an automatic telephone dialing system to send text-message solicitations without the written express consent of the called parties, the complaint said. Jones pays for three cellphone lines under a T-Mobile family plan, and he alleges the defendant texted all three lines well after the numbers were listed on the federal and state DNC registries. Brinker’s conduct was unfair, “immoral, unethical, oppressive and unscrupulous,” the complaint said. The plaintiff “wasted several weeks” researching, locating and hiring an attorney to bring his TCPA action to hold Brinker and its agents “accountable for their actions,” it added.

America Education Services (AES) regularly attempts to collect student loan debt using an automatic telephone dialing system to place calls using an artificial or prerecorded voice in violation of the Telephone Consumer Protection Act, alleged plaintiff Dominic Miraglia’s complaint Wednesday in U.S. District Court for Southern California. Miraglia, a San Diego resident, also alleges violations of the Fair Credit Reporting Act and California’s Rosenthal Fair Debt Collection Practices Act. The plaintiff filed for Chapter 7 bankruptcy in July 2022, listing AES as a creditor for an unpaid student loan balance of nearly $7,800, said the complaint. The bankruptcy court sent AES notice of the bankruptcy and automatic stay, but AES nevertheless continued phoning Miraglia to collect the debt, it said. Despite AES having notification of the plaintiff’s bankruptcy discharge, the defendant failed to report to the credit reporting agencies the debt as discharged, it said. AES’ “overwhelming” collection activities and substantial intrusion upon seclusion “directly and proximately” caused Miraglia “undue stress, irritability, anxiety, and confusion,” it said. As a direct result of AES’ actions, the plaintiff spent time and money consulting a lawyer, and incurred attorney fees and costs, it said.