After a Magistrate Court judge recommended that the defendants in a Fair Debt Collection Practices Act case file a motion for sanctions, a District Court judge in New York has denied the motion, ruling that the “reckless and overzealous advocacy” of the plaintiffs does not rise to the threshold of constituting “bad faith.”
A copy of the ruling in the case of Agoado, McNally, Moore, Pierre, Sharkey, and Vazquez v. Midland Funding, Rubin & Rothman, Forster & Garbus, Cohen & Slamowitz, Selip & Stylianou, and Pressler & Pressler can be accessed by clicking here.
The lawsuit was originally filed back in 2014 and has taken quite the path to get to this point. Essentially, the plaintiffs are accusing the defendants of obtaining default judgments by mis-stating the language of the FDCPA in affidavits and having employees with no knowledge of an account “robo-sign” affidavits.
A class-action lawsuit on Ohio making similar allegations against one of the defendants led the Magistrate Judge to require the plaintiffs file a new complaint. In the new complaint, however, the plaintiffs raised new claims that led the judge to strike the complaint and require another complaint to be filed. At the same time, the Magistrate judge granted the defendants’ request for sanctions.
But Judge William Kuntz, II of the District Court for the Eastern District of New York decided against sanctions, even though he applauded the Magistrate Judge’s “handling of the plaintiff’s petulance.”
While the plaintiffs did not follow the Magistrate Judge’s opinion in filing the new complaint, and “unreasonably multiplied the proceedings in this case,” the actions did not “meet the high threshold of constituting ‘bad faith,’ ” Judge Kuntz wrote.
