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Tag: Standing

7th Circuit: Spokeo Dooms FCRA 1681b Claim

Steven Uhrich

Link: Crabtree v. EXPERIAN INFORMATION SOLUTIONS, INC., Court of Appeals (7th Cir. 2020).

The 7th Circuit, in a decision by Judge Scudder, affirmed an opinion by District Court Judge Norgle dismissing a consumer’s FCRA claim—and, interestingly, a counterclaim by Experian—for lack of Article III standing and thus subject matter jurisdiction.

The claim was simple: Experian, through an agent, sold a copy of his consumer report for a purpose not allowed under the Fair Credit Reporting Act, 15 U.S.C. 1681b(a). The Complaint is available here.

The Complaint notes that Western Sierra (the company Experian sold the data to) is a debt settlement company and thus can’t make a firm offer of credit, but the 7th Circuit decision doesn’t mention that.

Instead, the decision focuses in on the fact that the Plaintiff couldn’t testify that he had not received a firm offer of credit from Western Sierra, and that the disclosure was made five years prior to filing the lawsuit.

After reviewing the 7th Circuit progeny of Spokeo, Inc. v. Robins, 136 S. Ct. 1540, 1548 (2016): Gubala v. Time Warner Cable, Inc., 846 F. 3d 909, Robertson v. Allied Solutions, LLC, 902 F. 3d 690, and Casillas v. Madison Avenue Associates, 926 F.3d 329 (7th Cir. 2019) (Discussed on this blog here), the panel concluded that the injuries were not sufficient to meet the Article III standard:

Crabtree has identified no harm of any kind. Like the plaintiff in Casillas who never attempted to respond to the debt collector and therefore was not affected by the incomplete instructions, Crabtree admitted in sworn testimony that he would have thrown any firm offer from Western Sierra in the trash. Indeed, he only learned about these events after being contacted by his lawyer nearly five years later. If this communication had not occurred, Crabtree would have gone on completely unaware of and unaffected by any prescreen list. This all falls well short of the concreteness mandated by Article III. Crabtree had to come forward with something showing that he did not receive a firm offer, that Western Sierra would not have honored a firm offer, that he was affected by the lack of a firm offer, or that he suffered any actual emotional damages. He failed on each possible ground, leaving him without the concrete injury necessary for Article III standing.

However, the panel clearly left the door open to similar claims on different facts:

Do not overread our conclusion to mean that a claim like Crabtree’s fails as a matter of course. Based on Spokeo‘s principles, there is no question that a consumer reporting agency’s unauthorized disclosure of consumer credit information can be a concrete injury. The common law recognized some right to privacy that “encompass[es] the individual’s control of information concerning his or her person.” U.S. Dep’t of Justice v. Reporters Comm. for Freedom of Press, 489 U.S. 749, 763 (1989). And FCRA specifically articulates a statutory right to privacy in consumer credit reports. See 15 U.S.C. § 1681(a). We have previously recognized this right to privacy in such information. See Cole v. U.S. Capital, Inc., 389 F.3d 719, 728 (7th Cir. 2004) (holding that a plaintiff stated a claim when a lender obtained her credit data without giving her the benefit of a firm offer, one of the permissible purposes under FCRA).

The disclosure of consumer credit information, absent any exchanged-for consumer benefit contemplated by FCRA, can constitute an injury-in-fact for the purpose of Article III standing. (emphasis added).

Experian’s counterclaim alleged that the Plaintiff also obtained consumer reports for an unlawful purpose: for the purpose of initiating the lawsuit at issue. The panel mostly agreed with the District Court judge that Experian could not rely on its costs incurred in defending the case under Steel Co. v. Citizens for a Better Environment, 523 U.S. 83 (1998), but found on independent grounds that Experian did not sufficiently allege how its reputation was injured by Plaintiff’s suit. The panel also said that attorney fees were not enough by themselves to sustain a counterclaim:

Put more simply, a party injured only by incurring defense costs—while injured for constitutional purposes—must find some statutory or common law hook for its motion or claim to recover those costs.

and the FCRA provided no such “hook”:

These statutory provisions make clear that Congress passed FCRA to protect consumers’ right to privacy in their credit data. The statutory objective was to confer protections on consumers, not to arm consumer reporting agencies with rights against consumers.

7th Circuit: No Harm No Foul on FDCPA Claim

Steven Uhrich

Link: Casillas v. Madison Ave. Associates, Inc., 926 F. 3d 329 (7th. Cir. 2019)

Plaintiff, represented by the law firms Philipps & Philipps and Berger Montague, brought a claim under the Fair Debt Collection Practices Act 15 U.S.C. § 1692g(a). Since the decision creates a circuit split, the opinion was circulated but a majority did not favor a rehearing en banc. Chief Judge Wood, joined by Circuit Judges Rovner and Hamilton, filed a dissent from the denial of rehearing en banc.

The Court briefly described the claim before finding it insufficient under the 7th Circuit’s prior Article III standing analysis in Groshek v. Time Warner Cable, Inc., 865 F.3d 884 (7th Cir. 2017):

[A] notice must include, among other things, a description of two mechanisms that the debtor can use to verify her debt. First, a consumer can notify the debt collector “in writing” that she disputes all or part of the debt, which obligates the debt collector to obtain verification of the debt and mail a copy to the debtor. Id. § 1692g(a)(4). A failure to dispute the debt within 30 days means that the debt collector will assume that the debt is valid. Id. § 1692g(a)(3). Second, a consumer can make a “written request” that the debt collector provide her with the name and address of the original creditor, which the debt collector must do if a different creditor currently holds the debt. Id. § 1692g(a)(5). Madison’s notice conveyed all of that information, except that it neglected to specify that Casillas’s notification or request under those provisions must be in writing.

The only harm that Casillas claimed to have suffered, however, was the receipt of an incomplete letter—and that is insufficient to establish federal jurisdiction. As the Supreme Court emphasized in Spokeo, Inc. v. Robins, Casillas cannot claim “a bare procedural violation, divorced from any concrete harm, and satisfy the injury-in-fact requirement of Article III.” ___ U.S. ___, 136 S.Ct. 1540, 1549, 194 L.Ed.2d 635 (2016). Article III grants federal courts the power to redress harms that defendants cause plaintiffs, not a freewheeling power to hold defendants accountable for legal infractions. Because Madison’s violation of the statute did not harm Casillas, there is no injury for a federal court to redress. (Emphasis added).

The panel ( Sykes and Barrett, Circuit Judges, and Durkin, District Judge) emphasized that they were disagreeing with the recent 6th Circuit Macy case:

Casillas’s best case is from the Sixth Circuit, which sees things differently than we do. In Macy v. GC Services Limited Partnership, the defendant violated the very same requirements that Madison did here: it failed to notify the plaintiffs that they had to dispute their debts in writing to trigger the protections of the Fair Debt Collection Practices Act. 897 F.3d 747, 751 (6th Cir. 2018). Like Casillas, the plaintiffs did not allege that they tried or had any intention of trying to contact the debt collector to verify the debt. Id. at 758. Instead, they claimed that not knowing about the writing requirement “could lead the least-sophisticated consumer to waive or otherwise not properly vindicate her rights under the [Act].” Id. The Sixth Circuit held that the plaintiffs had alleged a concrete injury because “[w]ithout the information about the in-writing requirement, Plaintiffs were placed at a materially greater risk of falling victim to `abusive debt collection practices.'” Id. (quoting 15 U.S.C. § 1692(e)).

Judge Wood had two major objections, one procedural and one substantive.:

 In demanding proof of injury, we need to guard against pushing a merits judgment into the Article III injury-in-fact inquiry; we also need to ensure that we are not, de facto, demanding fact pleading. The Supreme Court under-scored the standing/merits distinction in Lexmark Int’l, Inc. v. Static Control Components, Inc., 572 U.S. 118, 134 S.Ct. 1377, 188 L.Ed.2d 392 (2014), in which it took care to distinguish between an adequate allegation of injury-in-fact for standing purposes and the question whether that asserted injury fell within the scope of the statute on which the plaintiff was relying (there, the Lanham Act). Id. at 125-28, 134 S.Ct. 1377. It is possible to point to a real injury (and thus pass the Article III hurdle) but still lose on the merits for failing to state a claim on which relief can be granted. See FED. R. CIV. P. 12(b)(6).
We additionally need to be sure that we are not returning to a fact pleading regime, as it is not required or even acceptable under Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 8(a)(2) and it is not specifically required under this Act. We repeatedly have stressed that the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure use a notice-pleading standard, not a fact-pleading standard. A complaint need not include allegations about every element of a claim, as long as it meets the plausibility standard established in Bell Atlantic Corp. v. Twombly, 550 U.S. 544, 127 S.Ct. 1955, 167 L.Ed.2d 929 (2007), and Ashcroft v. Iqbal, 556 U.S. 662, 129 S.Ct. 1937, 173 L.Ed.2d 868 (2009).

As for the substantive issue, she felt the panel got it dead wrong:

[P]eople might not appreciate the need for a written record of their dealings with the debt collector and thus without a reminder that they must reduce their concerns to writing, they are likely to forfeit the important substantive rights the Act provides for them. When they receive a letter, they are often encouraged to call a 1-800 telephone number. But someone who responds to a debt-collection letter in that way will be put into a “Gotcha!” situation. No notification in writing equals greatly diminished protection under the Act.
It is a fair inference from Casillas’s complaint that Madison’s omissions at a minimum put her in imminent risk of losing the many protections in the Act that are designed to regulate the debt-collection process as it goes forward. The right to verification, the right to have the name and address of the original creditor, the right to cessation of debt-collection activities, and others, are far from bare procedural protections—they are protections that serve as the gateway to the Act’s substantive regime.

I am no fortune teller, but something tells me this split will end up before the Supreme Court sooner or later. Stay tuned.

No Standing for Claims Not Disclosed on Bankruptcy Petition

Steven Uhrich

Link: Kitchner v. FIERGOLA, Case No. 18-CV-133-JPS (E.D. Wisc., Sept. 18, 2018).

Judge J.P. Stadtmueller found that because the Plaintiff did not disclose her Fair Credit Reporting Act and Fair Debt Collection Practices Act claims on her Chapter 7 Bankruptcy petition, and because they arose prior to the filing of her bankruptcy, they were still property of the estate and the bankrtupcy trustee is the true party in interest for standing purposes. The court allowed the claim to be stayed under Rule 17:

Rule 17 instructs that “[t]he court may not dismiss an action for failure to prosecute in the name of the real party in interest until, after an objection, a reasonable time has been allowed for the real party in interest to ratify, join, or be substituted into the action. After ratification, joinder, or substitution, the action proceeds as if it had been originally commenced by the real party in interest.” Fed. R. Civ. P. 17(a)(3). Thus, Defendants having put Kitchner on notice of the standing issue, the Court is obliged to give Kitchner a reasonable period of time in which to ratify her commencement of the action by convincing the trustee to abandon these claims, or to substitute the trustee as the sole party plaintiff.

The court also rejected the defendant’s judicial estoppel defense, stating that the only person who could take inconsistent positions that would jeopardize the claims for purposes of judicial estoppel would be the trustee.

Summary Judgment Awarded Against Comcast for Impermissible Pull Claim

Steven Uhrich

Link: Santangelo v. Comcast Corporation, Case No. 15-cv-0293 (N.D. Ill., Sept. 17, 2018).

Plaintiff, represented by Keith Keogh of Keogh Law, Ltd., sued Comcast under the Fair Credit Reporting Act and the Illinois Consumer Fraud Act alleging they impermissibly pulled a credit check on him despite the fact he paid a $50 deposit to forgo a credit check when applying for internet services. As a result, his credit score dropped by six points. Comcast refunded Plaintiff the money he paid with interest and caused the hard pull to be masked. The parties filed cross motions for summary judgment which were both granted and denied in part.

FCRA Claim

Comcast argued that Plaintiff’s lowered credit score could not satisfy Article III’s injury-in-fact requirement with respect to his FCRA claim, because he has not shown that he was denied a loan, a purchase, or a credit application. Judge John Z. Lee disagreed, citing Evans v. Portfolio Recovery Assocs., LLC, 889 F.3d 337, 344-46 (7th Cir. 2018) for the proposition that “it is ‘very easy’ to envision a lowered credit score creating a real risk of financial or other harm that satisfies the injury-in-fact requirement.” The court also rejected the challenge to causation since the score dropped the same day as Comcast’s pull and that the case was not moot due to the refund or subsequent masking.

As to the merits, the parties disputed whether Comcast had a “legitimate business need” under § 1681b(a)(3)(F)(i), and the court found in favor of Plaintff:

There is no dispute that Comcast offered to provide Santangelo internet service without obtaining his TELCO information, if he paid a $50 deposit. And no reasonable jury could conclude that Comcast needed Santangelo’s credit score to determine his eligibility for service when Comcast’s own policies and representations to Santangelo indicated otherwise.

The court also ruled in favor of Plaintiff in regards to Comcast’s argument that Plaintiff agreed to the credit pull under § 1681b(a)(2), finding that it’s a strained argument and that Comcast failed to develop the record to support it. So liability as to the the FCRA claim was decided in favor of Plaintiff.

Whether Comcast violated the FCRA willingly or negligently (and thus whether Plaintiff may be awarded punitive damages or not) under § 1681n will be a fact for the jury:

There is evidence in the record from which a jury could reasonably conclude that the Comcast representative who initiated the credit check did so in error. But, there is other evidence from which a reasonable jury could conclude that Comcast knew or should have known that it would likely happen based upon prior experiences with similar incidents.

State Law Claims

The court found that as to the state law claims under the Illinois Consumer Fraud Act, breach of contract, and unjust enrichment, Plaintiff failed to adduce sufficient evidence of actual damages. As a result Comcast was awarded summary judgment on those counts. The court noted, however, that for purposes of Article III standing analysis, “actual damages and injury in fact ‘are not the same thing.’ Abbott v. Lockheed Martin Corp., 725 F.3d 803, 808 (7th Cir. 2013).”

No FDCPA Liability for Allegedly Invalid State Warrant

Steven Uhrich

Link: Chatman v. Weltman, Case No. 17-cv-06032 (N.D. Ill., Sept. 10, 2018).

Plaintiff, represented by Michael Jacob Wood of the Community Lawyers Group, Ltd., filed an action under the Fair Debt Colletion Practices Act. First, Plaintiff alleged Defendant used unfair and unconscionable means to collect a debt in violation of 15 U.S.C. § 1692f when he obtained an invalid warrant to arrest a consumer for the purposes of collecting a debt. Second, she claims that Defendant used false, deceptive, or misleading representations in violation of 15 U.S.C. § 1692e by represented an invalid warrant as valid for the purposes of collecting on an alleged debt.

After dispensing with whether the Plaintiff sufficiently listed her claim on her Chapter 7 Bankruptcy petition (she did), the court, judge Ruben Castillo, found the Rooker-Feldman doctrine divests the court of the ability to review the claim:

It is true that Plaintiff does not explicitly seek to vacate the warrant issued by the state court or otherwise set aside the state court’s default judgment, but both of her claims rest on a presumption that the warrant issued by the state court was “invalid” under state law … under Rooker-Feldman, the Court cannot make such a presumption, either explicitly or implicitly.

The Rooker-Feldman doctrine arises from Rooker v. Fidelity Trust Co., 263 U.S. 413 (1923), and D.C. Court of Appeals v. Feldman, 460 U.S. 462 (1983), which “hold that the Supreme Court of the United States is the only federal court that may review judgments entered by state courts in civil litigation.” Harold v. Steel, 773 F.3d 884, 885 (7th Cir. 2014).

 

7th Circuit Upholds FCRA Adverse Action Claim Under Spokeo

Steven Uhrich

Link: Robertson v. Allied Solutions, LLC, (7th. Cir. 2018)

Plaintiff Shameca Robertson, through Matthew A. Dooley, filed a putative class action lawsuit against Allied Solutions, LLC for its failure to provide an adverse-action notice as required under § 1681b(b)(3)(A) of the Fair Credit Reporting Act.  Robertson applied for a job with Allied and was rejected based on adverse criminal history information. Allied allegedly failed to give Robertson the notice required in the statute or a copy of the background check it relied on in making its decision. Plaintiff filed an unopposed motion to approve a settlement, but the court raised the issue of Article III standing sua sponte and demanded briefing on whether the case of Spokeo, Inc. v. Robins, 136 S. Ct. 1540 (2016) required dismissal. The district court (William T. Lawrence of the S.D. Ind) found that the claim failed to allege a concrete injury and dismissed the case.

The Seventh Circuit reversed, finding that given the language and purpose of the Act, an employer’s duty to disclose is not linked with the inaccuracy of the underlying report. Instead, the section regulating users of reports (like prospective employers) deal primarily with disclosures.

The substantive interest behind a user’s disclosure obligation is the one at issue here: allow the consumer to review the reason for any adverse decision and to respond. These rights are independent of any underlying factual disputes. A consumer might, for example, wish to concede the facts presented in the report but to bring additional facts to the employer’s attention that put matters in a better light for the consumer. In other words, the consumer might wish to use the “confession and avoidance” option that existed at common law … Providing context may be more valuable than contesting accuracy. Some consumers may collect supporting documents quickly enough to corroborate an accuracy challenge before the employer makes its decision.

The Court relied on precedent that finds that Article III standing is met where a plaintiff alleges they were deprived of a chance to obtain a benefit; so it doesn’t matter whether they were actually deprived of that benefit. Czyzewski v. Jevic Holding Corp.,137 S. Ct. 973, 983 (2017). The Court also noted that an informational injury can be concrete when the plaintiff is entitled to receive and review substantive information. In sum:

What matters is that Robertson was denied information that could have helped her craft a response to Allied’s concerns.

 

Court Grants Plaintiff’s Remand to State Court Based on Spokeo

Steven Uhrich

 

link: Soto v. Great America, LLC, 2017-cv-6902 (N.D. Ill., May 24, 2018)

Plaintiff Hugo Soto, represented by Edelman, Combs, Latturner & Goodwin LLC, filed a class action in Lake County, Illinois state court against Great America under 15 U.S.C. § 1681c(g)(1) of the Fair Credit Reporting Act as Amended by the Fair and Accurate Transactions Act of 2003, which prohibits printing more than the last five digits of a credit or debit card number on an electronically printed receipt.

Defendant removed the case to federal court and then Plaintiffs moved for a remand to state court on the basis that the court lacked jurisdiction because the damages alleged do not meet the federal standing requirements imposed by Spokeo, Inc. v. Robins, 136 S. Ct. 1540, 1547 (2016).

Judge Robert M. Dow agreed with Plaintiff’s reliance on Meyers v. Nicolet Restaurant of De Pere, LLC, 843 F.3d 724 (7th Cir. 2016), where the Seventh Circuit addressed the application of these standing principles to FACTA claims. The Seventh Circuit in Meyers held that plaintiffs alleging only bare procedural violations of FACTA lack Article III standing because they have not suffered an injury-in-fact. 843 F.3d at 727-28 (plaintiff lacked standing because his claim that restaurant failed to truncate a payment card’s expiration date did not allege actual harm and thus was insufficient to satisfy Article III’s injury-in-fact requirement).

Defendant argued the remand would be futile because the state court would lack jurisdiction to hear the case for the very same reason, relying on Porch-Clark v. Engelhart, 930 F. Supp. 2d 928, 936 (N.D. Ill. 2013). The court rejected this argument and found that remand was still warranted because the issue of Plaintiffs’ standing to pursue their FACTA claim in state court depends on an interpretation of state standing law, and that “it is not clear that the Illinois injury-in-fact requirement is identical to its federal analogue.”

Plaintiffs’ motion also requested attorneys’ fees pursuant to 28 U.S.C. § 1447(c), but the court denied that request and found that the defendant could have reasonably believed it would be able to distinguish Meyers given the damages alleged in the complaint.