/>iHAPPY MONDAY TCPAWORLD — it is GOOD to be officially be back!
As you might expect, I am INSANELY busy and its barely been a week. Welcome to the Troutman Firm — where we. never. stop.
So here is a quick one:
In Miernik v. W.S. Badcock Corporation, Plaintiff brought a class action in M.D. of Florida alleging Defendant Badcock Home Furniture made 23 prerecorded calls to her phone without consent.
Defendant brought a Rule 26(b) motion arguing the court lacked subject matter jurisdiction because the constitutional standing requirements of Article III — 1) an injury in fact 2) traceable to the defendant’s conduct and 3) likely to be redressed by a favorable judicial decision — were not satisfied.
Specifically, Defendant, citing to TransUnion, argued Plaintiff only alleged a “bare procedural violation of the TCPA without supporting facts to demonstrate that she suffered an injury in fact that is ‘concrete, particularized, and actual or imminent” and therefore lacked Article III standing.
In a swift 2 paragraph analysis, the court denied Defendant Badcock’s motion to dismiss on the basis that Plaintiff in her amended complaint, alleged she received 23 unsolicited phone calls with a pre recorded message and she and other call recipients were harmed by these calls because they were deprived of legitimate use of their phones and their privacy was invaded. Thus, establishing all Article III standing requirements.
This quick decision is a significant reminder that although some courts hold that the receipt of a single unwanted call is insufficient to afford Article III standing, courts can be quick to deny standing arguments when multiple unsolicited calls are alleged and invasion of privacy allegations are sufficient to confer standing at the pleadings stage.
Puja J. Amin authored this article.
