Deceptive robocallers must pay $30 million in civil penalties and...
Deceptive robocallers must pay $30 million in civil penalties and return more than $1.1 million in ill-gotten gains for violations of the FTC Act and the Telemarketing Sales Rule, a federal judge ruled in response to charges filed by the…
Sign up for a free preview to unlock the rest of this article
Timely, relevant coverage of court proceedings and agency rulings involving tariffs, classification, valuation, origin and antidumping and countervailing duties. Each day, Trade Law Daily subscribers receive a daily headline email, in-depth PDF edition and access to all relevant documents via our trade law source document library and website.
FTC. The civil order included a $20 million judgment against Paul Navestad and a $10 million judgment against Christian Maspakorn who, operating together as the “Cash Grant Institute,” made more than eight million robocalls to consumers, including more than 2.7 million calls to numbers on the federal Do Not Call Registry. The calls fraudulently promised consumers they were qualified for governmental “cash grants” of up to $25,000, and invited them to pay a fee to learn how to collect the mythical grants. The FTC, which filed the case in July 2009, said this was “by far the largest penalty ever imposed” for calls to consumers on the Do Not Call list. Rep. Ed Markey, D-Mass., who drafted the Telephone Consumer Protection Act that established the Registry, said he was “pleased” the FTC brought charges. “With Americans struggling through some of the toughest economic times in generations, it is the height of unscrupulousness to deceive consumers with the false promise of imminent financial relief,” Markey said Monday. “The Commission has been a tough cop on the beat for consumers, and I commend the court for agreeing with the FTC."