Chris Christie came into office on a promise to take the NJ Supreme Court off “its pedestal” and place it on a equal footing with the legislative and executive branches. The Star Ledger reports on the devisiveness that has permeated relations between NJ’s Governor and the Courts and its impact upon NJ’s legal system. You can read the article here.
Posts published in February 2012
The Wall Street Journal reports this morning that the private equity arm of Goldman Sachs along with PE player Advent International have agreed to acquire TransUnion. The deal is valued at $3 billion. The press release from Advent is here.
Yesterday the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (“CFPB”) released its proposed rule “Defining Larger Participants in Certain Consumer Financial Product and Service Market.” The proposed rule calls for the CFPB to regulate certain attorneys to protect the public welfare. Why? Becuase, Collection attorneys and law firms may collect through litigation (i.e., filing suit against consumers to collect debt). How dare those attorneys file complaints and litigate lawsuits. You can bet I’ll have a little more on the topic in a few days.
Last month the Missouri Supreme Court handed down a decision concerning a failure of proof in establishing chain of title on assignment of debt. The decision itself is unremarkable and you can read it here CACH v. Askew. The problem was simple – no testimony was proffered concerning the account being included in the prior assignee’s bill of sale, rather the trial court inferred the account was included in a “Schedule A” which should have been, but was not, attached to the prior assignee’s bill of sale. A few years back I participated in a teleconference for ACA International explaining bill…
The Federal Trade Commission had an epiphany last week – debt collectors must disclose in their communications that a debt subject to a statute of limitations defense creates a “legal right” which prevents a creditor from filing a lawsuit. Read it here: FTC Press Release, 1/30/12. It only took the federal agency 33 years of enforcing the Fair Debt Collection Practices Act (15 U.S.C. § 1692) (the “FDCPA”) to come to this conclusion. Quite a milestone and quite a reflection of our times. Although I haven’t been working on FDCPA issues quite as long as my colleagues in Washington, I’ve…