The Sixth Circuit Court of Appeals issued an opinion on Friday holding that private attorneys under contract with the Ohio attorney general’s office to collect debts owed to the state improperly used the office’s letterhead to scare debtors into paying. The court held that use of the letterhead of the Ohio attorney general’s office was a “false, deceptive or misleading” communication in violation of the Fair Debt Collection Practices Act, 15 U.S.C. § 1692e. With one judge on the three-judge panel dissenting, the court vacated a district court’s decision for the debt collector and the attorney general’s office, which had appeared in the case as an intervenor on the side of the defendant.
Read the decision in Gillie v. Law Office of Eric A. Jones, LLC.
