The U.S. Court of Appeals for the Seventh Circuit recently reversed as excessive a jury’s award of $3 million in punitive damages against a mortgage servicer for inadequate recordkeeping, misapplication of payments, and poor customer service. However, the Court affirmed the jury’s award of $582,000 in compensatory damages and remanded the case to the trial court with instructions to reduce the punitive damages award to $582,000, a 1:1 ratio of compensatory to punitive damages.
Posts tagged as “Seventh Circuit”
The U.S. Court of Appeals for the Seventh Circuit recently reversed the dismissal of a debtor’s claim under the federal Fair Debt Collection Practices Act, holding that the debtor stated a plausible claim that the dunning letter she received violated the FDCPA. Here, the Court held that the dunning letter at issue implied that the debt collector would file a 1099C form with the Internal Revenue Service, when in reality it was clear to the Seventh Circuit that the creditor would never file a 1099C form because the amount in each letter was less than $600.
The U.S Court of Appeals for the Seventh Circuit recently held that charging too much for goods or services, standing alone, is insufficient to assert a claim under the Illinois Consumer Fraud and Deceptive Business Practices Act (“ICFA”). Accordingly, the Seventh Circuit affirmed the trial court’s dismissal of a putative class action filed by condominium owners related to fees charged by a property management company and its vendor to provide various documents required to be provided to prospective purchasers of condominium units. A copy of the opinion in Horist v. Sudler and Company is available at: Link to Opinion. The…
The U.S. Court of Appeals for the Seventh Circuit recently affirmed in part and reversed in part a trial court’s judgment against a debtor who filed an adversary proceeding alleging that a creditor and its counsel violated the bankruptcy discharge by trying to collect a discharged debt, holding that the attorney could not be held in contempt because he lacked knowledge of the discharge, but the creditor could be held liable for the actions of its counsel under agency law. A copy of the opinion in Jacqueline M. Sterling v. Southlake Nautilus Health is available at: Link to Opinion. The plaintiff…
The U.S. Court of Appeals for the Seventh Circuit recently reversed a bankruptcy court’s ruling that a lender failed to perfect its security interest because its UCC financing statement failed to provide sufficient indication of the secured collateral under Article 9 of the Uniform Commercial Code. In so doing, the Seventh Circuit concluded that under the Illinois version of the UCC, a financing statement’s reference to an unattached security agreement sufficiently “indicates” the secured collateral as required by Article 9, and need not “contain” a specific description of the collateral within its four corners. A copy of the opinion in…
The U.S. Court of Appeals for the Seventh Circuit recently ruled in favor of a bank suing to recover for a fraudulent loan scheme, finding that the Illinois Limited Liability Company Act did not shield the closing agent company’s owner from liability in a fraud scheme because he was substantially involved in the fraud and the scheme would have failed without his individual participation. A copy of the opinion in Fifth Third Mortgage Company v. Kaufman is available at: Link to Opinion. Straw buyers submitted fraudulent loan applications to a bank. The participants in the scheme used an attorney to…
The U.S. Court of Appeals for the Seventh Circuit recently affirmed judgment in favor of two debt collectors and against a debtor for his claims arising under the federal Fair Debt Collection Practices Act (FDCPA) and the Wisconsin Consumer Act (WCA). In so ruling, the Court held that the debtor did not create a triable issue of material fact to overcome summary judgment because he failed to present sufficient evidence that the transactions comprising the credit card debt on the underlying account were for “personal, family, or household purposes,” and therefore that the debt was a “consumer debt” subject to…
Lavallee v. Med-1 Solutions, LLC from the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Seventh Circuit examines whether an email from a debt collector was an “initial communication” and if it was, whether a clickable hyperlink serves as a proper means of providing the validation notice mandated by section 1692g(a) of the federal Fair Debt Collection Practices Act. These disclosures, sometimes called the “validation notice,” can be contained in what the FDCPA refers to as the “initial communication” or provided “in writing” within five days of the initial communication. While the debt collector was found to have violated the FDCPA, the decision…
The U.S. Court of Appeals for the Seventh Circuit recently reversed a trial court order determining that res judicata barred a borrower’s fraud claims against a bank. In so ruling, the Court held that res judicata should not apply in this case because in the first action the borrower was a defendant and raised the fraud claim before the bank voluntarily dismissed the case when the borrower learned of the fraud claims and threatened to allege them against the bank. A copy of the opinion in Doherty v. Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation is available at: Link to Opinion. A borrower…
Distinguishing contrary rulings from the Eighth and Eleventh Circuits, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Seventh Circuit recently held that a debt collector’s percentage fee was recoverable under the language of a contract that required the consumer to pay “any costs (including reasonable attorney’s fees) incurred by [the creditor] in attempting to collect amounts due.” A copy of the opinion in Bernal v. NRA Group, LLC is available at: Link to Opinion. A consumer bought a monthly pass to Six Flags amusement parks. The contract stated that if the buyer failed to make the required monthly payments, he would…
The U.S. Court of Appeals for the Seventh Circuit recently held that a blind plaintiff lacked standing to sue under the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA) for alleged accessibility problems with a credit union’s website because he could not establish an injury in fact as a non-member. A copy of the opinion in Carello v. Aurora Policemen Credit Union is available at: Link to Opinion. The plaintiff, who is blind, sued a credit union, alleging that the credit union’s website violated his rights under the ADA because it was not accessible to blind people. Specifically, the plaintiff claimed that the credit…
The U.S. Court of Appeals for the Seventh Circuit recently affirmed a trial court’s ruling that a debtor lacked Article III standing to sue a debt collector for failing to notify her in its debt validation letter that to trigger the federal Fair Debt Collection Practices Act’s protections she had to communicate a dispute in writing because the only harm she suffered was receiving the incomplete letter. In so ruling, the Seventh Circuit created a circuit split on this issue as in Macy v. GC Services Limited Partnership, 897 F.3d 747 (6th Cir. 2018), where the Sixth Circuit held under…