New York Attorney General Eliot Spitzer has filed suit against Boyajian Law Offices, P.C., JBC Legal Group P.C. and JBC & Associates, P.C. for abusive debt collection practices and activities.
The suit alleges that the Boyajian companies (1) used dunning letters and falsely stated or implied that they came from attorneys; (2) falsely accused debtors of criminal activity, and threatened debtors with arrest; and (3) failed to supply verification of the debt when requested to do so.
In addition, they were apparently trying to collect on bad checks which were more than 6 years old - and in New York, the statute of limitations for bringing such a claim is 6 years. According to a report here the outfits were apparently collecting checks made payable to Ames and Bradlees, two retailers than have long since been out of business.
Boyajian released this fascinating statement:
"Our clients deserve the full protection under New York law to recover their losses from those who passed bad checks, regardless of the time period that may have elapsed," he said. "Instead of protecting the consumers, it appears the Attorney General of New York is seeking to protect bad check writers who have written checks in the past." [emphasis added].
This debt collector is saying "I don't care what the statute of limitations says"! Boyajian (who is reportedly a lawyer in California) is defending himself and his companies by saying that he does not care what the law says. And it's not like he could have been misquoted - this was from a written written statement.
Are these entities and are these activities what Congress is thinking of excluding from the Fair Debt Collection Practices Act? If it is, then consumers - and attorneys general in all 50 states need to be concerned.
See my prior posts:
Comments
For the past 4 nights i have been getting calls from this Boyajian law firm. They don't leave a message and they call me at exactly 8pm. I wondered as to why this place from NJ would call me when i have no current outstanding debt and when i have never ever written a bad check. I started looking online at all the message boards and your sight about Boyjian law and have found nothing but bad things so i am not going to answer the phone or even give them a chance to do anything to me freudulently.....Heres whats interesting though. Last week i recieved one of those fake lottory scam letters with a check for $1,998.00, telling me that i had won some lottory but that i had to cash the check and send them the money by Dec 22nd. I called these people and they did everything they could to assure me that it was legit, even though i didnt believe them, they then told me to call them again when i had cashed the check and was ready to send the money to them. I never called them back cause i am sure its a scam. Now all of a sudden i am getting these weird calls??? Mighty strange coincidence dont ya think?
Posted by: Tammy | December 28, 2006 11:35 PM