BAD GUYS TAKE NOTE: Submitting a Fake Consent Form to Set Up a TCPA Suit is Fraud– Court Allows Claim for Recovery of Fees

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As folks know, manufactured lawsuits continue to plague TCPAWorld.

Gross as it is to say, people literally go onto websites and fill in fake information with their phone number to get phone calls–just so they can sue the caller under the TCPA!

And it happens all the time.

Because of the huge damages available under the TCPA, many individuals continue to supply their name falsely on websites to attract phone calls and then sue for resulting calls. Some of these unsavory litigants have grown so bold as to sue over and over again demanding an ever-increasing settlement bounty.

Abusive lawsuits. Terrible.

Well in Anthony, No. 1:21-CV-02509, 2022 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 58998 (N.D. Ill.  March 30, 2022) a defendant bank countersued a Plaintiff for fraud alleging that the Plaintiff had manufactured his own lawsuit.

In the Bank’s version of events–as alleged in their counterclaim–the Plaintiff visited http://www.lowermyowninterestrate.com, purporting to provide apparent consent to be called under the name “Needle Dee” with the intent to manufacture this lawsuit.

The lead was sold to the Bank who made calls on the lead believing it was valid.

Plaintiff turned around and sued claiming that he had not actually visited the website and never went by the name “Needle Dee.”

The Bank sued Plaintiff right back for fraud–looking to recover all of the fees it incurred defending the suit as damages.

The Plaintiff moved to dismiss arguing that the allegations of fraud had not been established but the Court disagreed. Concluding that supplying a fake name to create a lawsuit was absolutely potentially fraudulent the Court allowed the case to proceed past the pleadings stage:

It sounds bizarre, but as far as Rule 9(b) goes, the specific facts are pleaded. The Bank gives the date of the fraudulent statement (January 10, 2021), the specific content of the false statements (fake name and fake consent to receive a phone call), what the Bank did in response (make the phone calls via its vendor), and what the Bank employee talked about with Anthony. The specifics are all there.

Interestingly, the Court also found that the name “Needle Dee” was not so obviously fake as to destroy the reasonableness of the bank’s reliance on the fake lead.

Anthony is an extremely important case and one that gives a great roadmap to companies that are facing manufactured lawsuits. Countersuing fake consent-suppliers for fraud is ABSOLUTELY what folks should be doing–where the facts support the allegations– so we can clean up these abusive lawsuits. While it is true that the lead gen industry also needs to clean up its own act, litigants lying and cheating their way into TCPA lawsuits commit a fraud upon the court and waste critical judicial resources that are much needed elsewhere. Plus they’re just plain stealing. Really gross stuff and I love to see the caller here pushing back.

Obviously I don’t know whether Anthony really did submit a fake lead or not–the merits of the case are yet to be determined–but this does happen all the time. And when it does defendants need to be willing to do the hard work of pushing back and not just roll over and write an easy check…

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Published by Eric J. Troutman

The Czar of TCPAWorld Eric Troutman is one of the country’s prominent class action defense lawyers and is nationally recognized in Telephone Consumer Protection Act (TCPA) litigation and compliance. He has served as lead defense counsel in more than 70 national TCPA class actions and has litigated nearly a thousand individual TCPA cases in his role as national strategic litigation counsel for major banks and finance companies. He also helps industry participants build TCPA-compliant processes, policies, and systems. Eric has built a national litigation practice based upon deep experience, rigorous analysis and extraordinary responsiveness. Eric and his team feel equally at home litigating multibillion dollar telecommunications class actions in federal court as they do developing and executing national litigation strategies for institutions facing an onslaught of individual TCPA matters. They thrive in each of these roles – delivering consistently excellent results – while never losing sight of the client experience. While many firms now tout TCPA expertise, Eric has been there from the beginning. He built one of the country’s first TCPA-only defense teams and began serving as national TCPA counsel for his clients nearly a decade ago. This perspective allows him to swiftly develop the right litigation strategies for dealing with recurring problems, without wasting time on tactics that are bound to fail. Eric’s rich historical perspective and encyclopedic knowledge of the TCPA landscape also make him an invaluable resource to institutional compliance teams struggling to comply with the shifting regulatory landscape. No task is too small – or too big. Indeed, Eric and his team have helped build TCPA-compliant systems and processes for some of the largest and most complex corporate entities in the country. He commonly works with in-house compliance counsel to build and implement enterprise and business-line specific TCPA solutions, performs TCPA audits and drafts and reviews proposed TCPA policies and procedures. He and his team also have the technical expertise necessary to assist call centers seeking to develop TCPA-resistant call path architecture or to modify existing telephony and software integration to better insulate from potential TCPA exposure. Eric has built a reputation for thought leadership. An avid blogger and speaker, he has been at the forefront of the industry’s effort to push for clarity and a return to sanity for the TCPA for years. He was selected to advocate for the financial services industry on important TCPA issues before the Federal Communications Commission and co-authored the nation’s only comprehensive practice guide on TCPA defense. In his spare time, Eric leads defense teams representing banks and other financial services companies in consumer finance litigation matters. He has experience representing clients in UCC, TILA, RESPA FCRA, CCRA, CLRA, FDCPA, RFDCPA and FCCPA claims, as well as in fraud and bank operations issues.

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  1. Another case that will eventually show that it wasn’t the plaintiff that was the “bad guy” that manufactured a lawsuit, but the marketing company, in this case, FDE Marketing Group, that manufactured the consent once poo poo hit the fan, although calling them “bad guys” would be the understatement of the century. Scum of the earth is more like it for these scumbag robocallers. How do I know? I was called by FDE on behalf of FSB myself. Guess who they were trying to reach? The previous owner of my number. Where did they get that info from? Any number of websites like Spokeo that still show this other person as the owner of that number, or other public records. If I had to have taken FSB to court, what would have happened next? A form showing I filled out the previous owners info into a website no one would ever come across even if you went into page 20 of a google search, with a date predating the calls. Marketing scam complete. “Bad guys manufacturing lawsuits”. LMAO.

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