New York Car Accident Attorney,info???
Q: I received a junk fax this morning at work from "Did-It.Com, Inc." I haven't been reading news.admin.net-abuse.email for a while, but somehow I suspected that I wasn't the only one, so I did a DejaNews search, and lo and behold, previous postings in this group confirm that these folks used to be spammers and have moved on to junk faxing. The general consensus a month or so ago in this group seemed to be that the right way to deal with the junk faxes was to send a letter demanding the $500 civil penalty for an unsolicited fax advertisement, and then if they refused to pay, to file suit against them in small-claims court. I disagree with that approach for two reasons. First of all, the small-claims judge may very well throw out the case due to lack of jurisdiction (if you don't live in New York, your local small-claims court probably doesn't have jurisdiction over a company in New York). Second, even if the court agrees to hear the case and you win (by default, probably, since they probably won't show up), how do you expect to collect your settlement? Unless you live in New York, that's going to be very difficult. The time you spend doing it is probably not going to be worth the $500. I have another approach, which I carried out this morning after I received the junk fax. First, I called the company long-distance to complain. Of course, the woman I spoke to claimed that their company never sends out junk faxes, i.e., that I must have spoken with one of their representatives and given them my fax number. Yeah, right. That's bull and I told her so. After confirming through that phone call that they were knowingly breaking the law, I did two things: 1) Filed a complaint with the Better Business Bureau. 2) Files a complaint with the State of New York Attorney General's office. I encourage anyone else who has received an unsolicited junk fax from this company to take these two steps as well. The first one is free and the second one will cost you only a stamp. The more people complain, the more likely it is that the BBB and/or the New York Attorney General will do something about it. Furthermore, if enough people complain, the Attorney General may very well force the company to pay damages to all the people to whom they sent junk faxes. Now, wouldn't it be better to have the New York Attorney General do the work for you, rather than trying to nail these slimeballs in small-claims court?
A: -Any court in any state may hear a junk fax law violation, including the small claims court in your jurisdiction, irrespective of what state the sender of the fax is. This is specifically stated in the TCPA '91. Further, the law allows your state attorney general to file a class action suit on your behalf, if he so chooses, which is the route you have chosen. As for collection, a judgement is enforcible all US States. If you can serve the subpoena, you can enforce the judgement -- provided that the defendent has assets to seize. Or you can sell the debt to a collection agency and let them chase the spam-faxer down and collect. -I went and looked at the law, and I suspect that what you were talking about is this paragraph: "Any civil action brought under this subsection in a district court of the United States may be brought in the district wherein the defendant is found or is an inhabitant or transacts business or wherein the violation occurred or is occurring, and process in such cases may be served in any district in which the defendant is an inhabitant or where the defendant may be found." Note