Sovereign citizens remind me of a great line from “Hoosiers.” Essentially, there are two types of dumb: the guy that gets naked and runs out in the snow and barks at the moon, and the guy who does the same thing in my living room. First one don’t matter, the second one you’re kinda forced to deal with. Sovereign citizen cases are fun to hear about and read about but not always fun to deal with when you are on the other side. In a case that was defended by Jonathan Robbin of J. Robbin Law, a District Court judge in New York has granted a defendant’s motion for judgment on the pleadings in a Fair Debt Collection Practices Act case that was started because a sovereign citizen claimed not to have received all the documents he requested when he disputed the debt.
The background: The plaintiff opened a credit card account in March 2023 and made payments for about six months. The debt was charged off and sold to the defendant which hired a collection operation to service the account. When collection efforts began, the plaintiff styled himself as “Executor of the Precedent Vested Landed Estate of [his] Living Trust” and began sending pseudo-legal notices, including one labeled an “Affidavit High Prerogative Writ of Quo Warranto.” These notices demanded extensive proof that the collectors had a legal right to pursue the debt and claimed that failure to respond would settle the obligation.
- The defendant provided verification of the debt, including account information, a chain of title, and credit card statements.
- The plaintiff argued that these responses were inadequate because they did not meet his own list of verification demands. He then filed suit alleging violations of the FDCPA and breach of fiduciary duty.
The ruling: Judge Hector Gonzalez of the District Court for the Eastern District of New York dismissed the case with prejudice, finding that the defendants had properly verified the debt under the FDCPA. The court noted that “a written statement that shows the debt, original creditor, the debt collector, and other basic information is sufficient for verifying a debt.” The plaintiff’s demand for “specific verification requirements” was irrelevant to what the statute requires.
- As for fiduciary duty, the court rejected the claim entirely, writing that the supposed “Precedent Vested Estate” did not exist and that “a debtor-creditor relationship, standing alone, does not create a fiduciary duty.” Judge Gonzalez concluded that even if all of the plaintiff’s allegations were construed liberally, the claims were implausible.
- The court also denied the plaintiff’s request to amend his complaint to add claims under the Fair Credit Reporting Act, the Truth in Lending Act, and the Uniform Commercial Code, finding those amendments would be futile because they had no basis in law.
- One notable line from the ruling captured the futility of the claims: “No matter how liberally the Court construes Plaintiff’s complaint, Plaintiff cannot satisfy a single element necessary to his fiduciary duty claims.”
