Earlier this month, the Northern District of Illinois struck the class allegations in Cholly v. Uptain Group, Inc., a single-count TCPA case filed against a medical services provider and a debt collector based on allegedly autodialed calls the plaintiff received. The defendants had sought to dismiss the complaint on several…
On Monday, January 30, 2017, the Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit held in Van Patten v. Vertical Fitness Group, LLC, No. 14-55980, that the plaintiff’s allegation that he received unsolicited text messages in violation of the Telephone Consumer Protection Act (TCPA) satisfied the “concrete injury” standing requirement as articulated…
A recent decision by the Ninth Circuit has created a circuit split regarding the interpretation of the Fair Debt Collection Practices Act (FDCPA). In Vien-Phung Ho v. ReconTrust Co. et al., case no. 10-56884, the court held that the trustee of a California deed of trust is not a “debt collector” under the…
Goodwin, a leading Global 50 law firm, announced today the release of the 2016 Consumer Finance Year in Review, a detailed report that highlights the major litigation, enforcement and regulations that impacted the consumer finance industry in 2016. The second annual report, produced by the firm’s Financial Industry and Consumer…
On January 17, 2017, Maria Vullo, the Superintendent of the New York State Department of Financial Services (NY DFS) sent a letter to the Office of the Comptroller Currency (OCC), opposing the OCC’s proposed special purpose charter for Fintech companies. The NY DFS adds to the existing resistance by state…
On December 13, 2016, the Ninth Circuit heard oral argument in Robins v. Spokeo (No. 11-56843) on remand from the Supreme Court. We wrote extensively (here, here, and here) about Spokeo before and after the Supreme Court’s May 16, 2016 decision. As readers may recall, the Central District of California had…
On November 8, 2016, the U.S. Supreme Court heard oral arguments in Lightfoot v. Cendant Mortg. Corp., a case that will decide an important jurisdictional issue for Federal National Mortgage Association (FNMA). See 769 F.3d 681 (9th Cir. 2014), cert. granted, 136 S. Ct. 2536 (2016). The question before the Court…
On October 31, 2016, the Supreme Court of Georgia issued a lengthy opinion ruling against payday lenders in two cases consolidated on appeal. The two cases (Western Sky Financial, LLC v. State of Georgia, No. S16A1011 and State of Georgia v. Western Sky Financial, LLC, No. S16X1012) involved state regulation…
Today the United States Court of Appeals for the DC Circuit issued its long-awaited ruling in the PHH v. CFPB appeal (opinion here). LLW has written about the PHH case here and here before, and below are some quick takeaways from the court’s 110-page ruling for industry watchers: The court determined that…
On September 2, 2016, the Eleventh Circuit affirmed dismissal of a civil RICO claim in Ray v. Spirit Airlines, Inc., a case that challenged Spirit Airlines’ reporting of fees to customers. The Eleventh Circuit’s affirmance focused on the plaintiffs’ failure to allege the hidden fees were the proximate cause of…
On August 3, 2016, Goodwin filed an amicus brief in the Washington Supreme Court on behalf of the Mortgage Bankers Association and the Consumer Mortgage Coalition. The case—Jordan v. Nationstar Mortgage LLC—involved a challenge to a servicer’s default-servicing practice of rekeying the lock on the front door of seemingly abandoned…
Last week, the United States District Court for the District of Columbia rejected a constitutional challenge to rules promulgated by the CFPB. In State National Bank of Big Spring v. Geithner, the plaintiffs (a small Texas bank and other interested parties) challenged the Bureau’s regulatory authority on separation-of-power and recess-appointment…
Goodwin Procter partner Thomas Hefferon will serve as co-chair of the July 28-29, 2016 conference, and will speak on a panel titled “Fair Lending: Managing and Defending Against Claims of Discriminatory, Predatory, and Abusive Lending and Assessing the Status of ‘Disparate Impact’ in Lending Litigation and Enforcement” on July 29, 2015.
Today, the Supreme Court released its opinion in Spokeo v. Robins, vacating the Ninth Circuit’s decision and remanding the case for further proceedings. Our earlier posts on the case (here, here, and here) provide more detailed background on the facts of the case, but by way of short introduction, Spokeo…
Joe Yenouskas, a partner in Goodwin Procter’s Consumer Financial Services Litigation Group, will speak on a June 2, 2016 webinar about consumer finance class actions. His presentation will examine recent developments and trends in class action claims alleging violations of federal consumer protection laws governing the financial services industry, including…
On May 5, 2016, the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau issued long-expected proposed rules that will drastically limit the use of pre-dispute arbitration clauses in contracts for consumer financial products and services. First, the proposed rules would prohibit pre-dispute arbitration agreements that bar consumers from filing or participating in a class…
On March 22, the Supreme Court issued its decision in Tyson Foods, Inc. v. Bouaphakeo. For those unfamiliar with the case, Tyson Foods is a Fair Labor Standards Act (FLSA) case that involved an alleged failure to pay overtime to employees who spent significant time “donning and doffing” (putting on…
On February 17, 2016, the Third Circuit handed a creditor and its law firm a win in a Fair Debt Collection Practices case filed in bankruptcy court finding that a couple who sued over the Rule 2004 Examination Subpoena in their bankruptcy case could not have been misled by that…
As an ongoing update to our coverage of the Spokeo case, today we look at what could happen in the case where, with Justice Scalia’s recent death coming after oral argument but before an opinion was issued, the court’s new composition has created some ambiguity regarding the outcome. Given that there is an eight person…
Do borrowers have standing to challenge a non-judicial foreclosure on the ground of alleged defects in an assignment from the original lender to a successor? This is a question that has divided courts, both in California and across the country. See, e.g., Glaski v. Bank of Am., 218 Cal. App….