Vijayasri G. Aryama, Author at TCPA Blog

varyama

Vijayasri “Sri” Aryama assists clients with various aspects of legal proceedings and trial preparation, including legal research and the drafting of motions and other legal memoranda. While attending Rutgers Law School, Sri interned at the Department of Homeland Security in the Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) division. She conducted legal research and drafted briefs, memos, and Motions to Reopen on complex matters of immigration law, including criminal law violations that could impact removal proceedings. During law school, Sri also worked as a tax compliance contractor for an international security systems company, where she reviewed and resolved state and city tax notices for numerous corporate entities and regularly tested internal controls to ensure Sarbanes-Oxley compliance. Sri was also a research and technology editor for the Women’s Rights Law Reporter.

View the full bio for varyama at the Faegre Drinker website.

Articles by varyama:

Florida Court Finds One Unwanted Text Message Does Not Cause Concrete Harm, Remands FTSA Case to State Court

In Weitz v. Genting New World LLC, No. 1:22-cv-23209-BLOOM, 2023 WL 2328365, at *1 (S.D. Fla. Mar. 2, 2023), Plaintiff Brandon Weitz brought suit against Defendant Genting New World LLC on behalf of himself and a putative class in Florida state court, alleging violations of the Florida Telephone Solicitation Act (“FTSA”). Defendant removed the case to the United States District Court for the Southern District of Florida. Id.

Sometimes dubbed Florida’s “Mini-TCPA,” the FTSA regulates telemarketing activities within Florida. The law was designed to protect consumers from unwanted telemarketing calls and ensure that telemarketers comply with certain rules and regulations. The FTSA prohibits certain acts, such as calling individuals who are on the National Do Not Call Registry, using automatic dialing systems to call emergency phone numbers, and using pre-recorded messages without prior consent.

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Business or Residential? Ambiguity Surrounding Number on Do Not Call Registry Can Defeat Class Certification

In an interesting decision from the District Court of Oregon, United States Magistrate Judge Youlee Yim You recommended granting a motion to deny class certification where uncertainty about the appropriate classification of a cell phone number’s use was enough to make the plaintiff an inadequate class representative with atypical claims. Mattson v. New Penn Fin., LLC, No. 3:18-cv-00990, 2021 WL 1406875 (D. Or. Mar. 8, 2021).

In Mattson, the plaintiff filed a TCPA class action, claiming the defendant, New Penn Financial, LLC, called his cell phone while it was registered on the national Do Not Call Registry in violation of 47 C.F.R. § 64.1200(c). Id. at *1. As readers of this blog will note, 47 C.F.R. § 64.1200(c)(2) prohibits telephone solicitations made to residential telephone subscribers who are registered on the Do Not Call Registry. New Penn sought denial of class certification, arguing the uncertainty of Plaintiff’s standing made his claims atypical, rendering him an inadequate class representative. Id. In considering the motion, the Court identified an issue unique to the plaintiff—whether the cell phone number at issue was properly considered a residential or business telephone number. Id. at *5.

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4th Circuit Declines to Consider Dish Network’s “Premature” Appeal of District Court’s $11 Million Final Disbursement Order

As readers of this blog may recall, the Middle District of North Carolina recently denied Dish Network’s request for reversion of $11 million in unclaimed funds from the jury-awarded damages in a TCPA class action trial. See Krakauer v. Dish Network, LLC, No. 14-0333 (M.D.N.C. Oct. 27, 2020). Noting that the TCPA is a deterrence statute, the District Court held that allowing unclaimed funds to revert to the defendant would undermine the function of the damage award, and it determined that such funds should either escheat to the government or be donated to an appropriate charity whose work is related to the objectives of the TCPA. But the District Court did not decide the ultimate recipient of the unclaimed funds, appointing a special master to identify and evaluate potential cy pres recipients and make recommendations to the court.

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Court Finds that Debt Collection Makes Use Of Random or Sequential Number Generation Implausible

In a victory for debt collectors, the Central District of Illinois recently found that a plaintiff’s bare-bones allegations regarding use of an ATDS were particularly implausible because “the business of the defendant is such that it would not need a machine with random or sequential number generation capacities.” Mosley v. Gen. Revenue Corp., No. 20-01012, 2020 WL 4060767, at *3 (C.D. Ill. July 20, 2020).

In Mosley v. General Revenue Corp., the plaintiff alleged that a debt collection company used an ATDS and prerecorded messages to call her cellular telephone without her consent. Id. at *1. She claimed the calls concerned debts that were not hers, and some calls started with short pauses and “dead air.” Id.

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District of New Jersey Adopts Narrow ATDS Definition as Circuit Split Grows; Supreme Court Clarification Required

As readers of this blog know, a robust Circuit split has developed regarding the meaning of an ATDS. The Second and Ninth Circuits have taken one approach, while the Third, Seventh, and Eleventh Circuits have taken another. While we await Supreme Court guidance, lower courts continue to grapple with the ATDS issue. In Eisenband v. Pine Belt Automotive, Inc., No. 17-8549 (FLW) (LHG), 2020 WL 1486045 (D.N.J. Mar. 27, 2020), the District of New Jersey analyzed the definition of an ATDS and concluded that equipment that dials numbers from a manually prepared list does not constitute an ATDS.

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Court Denies Atypical Plaintiff’s Motion to Certify Unascertainable Fail-Safe Class

The Middle District of Florida has denied a motion for class certification, finding the proposed class definition would have created a fail-safe class, the class members were not ascertainable, and the plaintiff’s claims were not typical of the class. Fennell v. Navient Solutions, LLC, No. 17-2083, 2019 WL 3854815, at *2 (M.D. Fla. 2019)

The plaintiff in Fennell alleged that, despite her revocation of consent, Navient had used an ATDS to repeatedly call her to collect a debt. Id. at *1. In response, Navient argued that, although it had used predictive dialers to call other people, it had not used that equipment to call the plaintiff because her delinquent loans had been assigned to Navient’s “Cures Unit,” which only made calls through manual dialing. Id. at *1, *2.

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Court Holds That Text-Messaging System Must Be Able to Randomly or Sequentially Generate Numbers to Qualify as an ATDS

The Northern District of Illinois recently entered summary judgment against a group of plaintiffs because it found the system at issue was not an ATDS.

In Smith v. Premier Dermatology, No. 17-3712, 2019 WL 4261245 (N.D. Ill. Sept. 9, 2019), the Defendants used a proprietary “eRelevance” system to send medical marketing communications by text message to their clients’ customers or patients. Defendant eRelevance Corporation would have its clients provide their current and prospective customer contact information, which would be uploaded into the eRelevance system. Based on client-selected criteria, the system would create lists of contacts, and once eRelevance employees built a text-message marketing campaign, they could push a button to have the system automatically send text messages to each contact on the list.

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