The Supreme Court recently ruled that it is legal for lawyers hired in special cases to use the Attorney General’s letterhead. You may be scratching your head and wondering: Why did this case make it all the way to the United States Supreme Court? Don’t judges have more important things to worry about?

Believe it or not, as a lawyer who sues debt collectors for a living, this is a very important case. Suing debt collectors and debt collection law firms can be very complicated. We use a ‘less sophisticated’ consumer standard in most of these cases. Therefore, when evaluating any debt collection activity, we must put ourselves and our clients in the shoes of the less sophisticated consumer.

The case taken to the Supreme Court questioned whether or not it was legal for contract attorneys (hired to collect state debts) to use the Attorney General’s letterhead when sending debt collection letters.

The question
The reason this case came before the Supreme Court is because the Fair Debt Collection Practices Act (FDCPA) states that third-party debt collectors may not deceive or mislead consumers when collect consumer debts. Some people believed that using letterhead that did not belong to the attorneys responsible for collecting the state’s debt was misleading to the less sophisticated consumer.

However, the Supreme Court has found that this practice is not deceptive, as these lawyers do represent the state. The court noted and found the following to be true in this case:

“Special counsel does not create a false impression by doing exactly what they have been ordered to do…use of the Attorney General’s letterhead conveys with the authority of whom the special counsel is writing to the debtor.”

What does the law protect against?
It is still illegal for any third party debt collector to attempt to collect a debt using deceptive measures. The above case proved that the debt collectors did not break any laws, but any debt collector disguised as another person or something else is illegal. While I really don’t like seeing a consumer lose a case to a debt collector, I think the Supreme Court made the right decision.

This case is important as it draws a line in the sand between what is legal when it comes to the Fair Debt Collection Act and what is clearly misleading and illegal. If you think someone is trying to collect a debt in violation of the Fair Debt Collection Act, be sure to contact a reputable and trusted attorney.