Todd Rokita, the Attorney General for the state of Indiana, yesterday announced his office has filed a lawsuit against a telecom company for acting as a gateway provider to scammers making hundreds of millions of illegal robocalls across the country.
The lawsuit was filed against Startel Communications, which is owned and operated by Wanda Hall and Abhijit Chowdhury in Evansville, Ind. The suit also named two other defendants — Piratel and VoIP Essential — companies that Rokita claims knew Startel was helping make illegal robocalls and were each paid $100,000 to look the other way.
Most of the illegal robocalls originated from India, the Philippines, and Singapore, according to Rokita, and were the garden variety robocall scams, such as impersonating representatives from the Internal Revenue Service or Social Security Administration and threatening arrest or legal action if money was not paid immediately.
Consumer complaints made to the AG’s office were the motivation for launching an investigation and ultimately leading to the lawsuit that was filed. The investigation was launched about 18 months ago, according to Rokita.
“Hoosiers are sick and tired of being harassed by illegal and unwanted robocalls, and Kathy and I are two of them,” Rokita said in a statement, referring to he and his wife. “Just as I promised, we will stay on the offense in our efforts to protect Indiana consumers and bring these people to justice.”
The defendants are accused of violating both state law in Indiana and federal law, and are facing penalties that could include “billions” of dollars in fines, according to the AG’s statement about the lawsuit.
