LoanDepot Raises Multiple Constitutional Defenses in Answering TCPA Complaint
LoanDepot didn’t “directly” violate the Telephone Consumer Protection Act, and plaintiff Kristi Hull “fails to allege a claim under any theory of vicarious liability,” said the mortgage lender’s answer Thursday (docket 1:23-cv-02567) in U.S. District Court for Colorado in Denver…
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to Hull’s Oct. 2 complaint (see 2310030001). Court records show Hull’s complaint was the 28th TCPA action filed against loanDepot since May 2014. Hull alleges that loanDepot “incessantly” placed telemarketing calls to her cellphone, despite not having the “appropriate form of consent” to call her, and notwithstanding that her number was listed on the national do not call registry since August 2012. But Hull lacks Article III standing to bring her action because she didn’t suffer “an injury-in-fact as a result of loanDepot’s alleged conduct,” said loanDepot’s answer. The company said it didn’t willfully or knowingly contact Hull on the phone numbers at issue without prior express consent. LoanDepot said its actions “were proper and legal, and at all times it acted with good faith and without malice.” Application of the TCPA, as interpreted by the FCC, violates the First Amendment because such application relies on “content-based restrictions of protected speech,” said loanDepot’s answer. The statute also is unconstitutionally vague because TCPA restrictions don’t give “a person of ordinary intelligence adequate notice of the conduct that is prohibited,” said the lender. Any award of punitive or statutory damages against loanDepot would be unconstitutional “as violative” of the due process clause of the 14th Amendment and the excessive fines clause of the Eighth Amendment, it said. “The amount of damages prescribed by the TCPA statute are so severe and oppressive as to be wholly disproportionate to the offense and obviously unreasonable,” loanDepot said. “Any award of damages should be reduced to comport with due process,” it said.