The Appellate Division of the Superior Court of New Jersey has affirmed a lower court’s ruling in favor of a defendant that was sued in New Jersey small claims court for violating the Fair Debt Collection Practices Act, agreeing with the lower court that the suit was filed in the wrong jurisdiction.
A copy of the ruling in the case of Brown v. PlusFour can be accessed by clicking here.
The plaintiff accused the defendant of violating the FDCPA by not validating a debt that was disputed and continuing to report the debt to the credit reporting agencies. The plaintiff resided in New Jersey when the complaint was filed. The defendant moved to dismiss the complaint, arguing that an FDCPA claim was the jurisdiction of the federal court, not state court, and that a federal court in Nevada was the proper venue. Nevada was the proper venue, according to the defendant, because that’s where the defendant is based and because that’s where the plaintiff was living when the alleged infraction occurred. The debt was assigned to the defendant by a client who performed medical services on the plaintiff in Nevada. The state court dismissed the complaint for lack of jurisdiction, which the plaintiff appealed.
The appeals court noted that the defendant was located in Nevada and that the cause of action arose out of conduct that occurred in Nevada. There is nothing that tied this case to New Jersey and the court had no jurisdiction over the defendant, the Appeals Court wrote.
