JDB threatening lawsuit
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Posted by jdbs suck
(24.19.42.0) on August 11, 2004 at 22:08:49:
Hello there. Long-winded message. Please bear with me! Recently received a rather threatening letter from First Resolution Management Corporation for a charged-off Providian account they own with a date of last activity from two years ago (within SOL). The amount is about $3xxx including 2x% interest being billed. (2x% all this time yeah right) Palisades sold the account to them. I'm in WA state with three year SOL for open accounts. Been going through several credit boards for several weeks, trying to help myself, but I have information overload and unsure how to take care of this. Unfortunately, due to obtaining a recent car loan and disputing a few other minor items on my credit reports (nothing to do with this one), I've managed to get their attention. I opted out now, but I'm afraid the damage is done as they have all my information. I wish I joined this board earlier and I would have followed the advice to lie down low. There seem to be several camps when dealing with a CA/JDB: 1) Fight everything. Send limited C&D letters, demand verification, dispute with bureaus after that, etc etc in the hopes that the CA will become intimidated with your knowledge of the law and will think twice about screwing with you in court, especially if you can counter-sue on all these FDCPA violations. (See this a lot on creditboards.com) 2) Do not respond to anything unless you receive a valid summons and then you respond in court. By ignoring them, the evil CA/JDB will think that you might be judgment proof and you don't have anything to lose. They will move on to the next victim who might give a crap, (category 1) who could be forced to settle, especially if the reason they're fighting so diligently is to obtain a mortgage. If they do take you to court, they will be ill-prepared for your vigorous defense. They will need to prove to the judge without a doubt that the debt is yours (I see this viewpoint a lot on this board.) 3) Do absolutely nothing in court and get a default judgment against you. Fighting in court is a uphill battle where the odds are stacked against you. Judges typically back CAs, unless you have a solid defense. Judges don't like frivilous motions and arguments about FDCPA violations. CAs will bring just enough evidence to convince a judge. But, when they obtain a default judgment, you can most likely vacate it due to some mistake these CA lawyers commonly make, especially if they don't think you're going to defend yourself later. The CA will give up or will have to start over again and before you know it your SOL will be up (see this on Creditwrench). Right now, I'm going by number two and not making any kind of communication with the CA/JDB. Here's my situation: Shortly, after I was sent their first letter, listing mini-miranda, received a phone call from one of their reps, but I quickly hung-up on him. He called back and left a rude voicemail calling me in effect, a deadbeat and threatening to take this to the next level. Needless to say, I never called back. He never called back either. Now it's a month later and I've got this nasty letter. To paraphrase: "This is a final notice.... We're the legal owner of the debt. Transferring this to a pre-litigation liason to organize information to send it to a lawyer in your area. Call us if you wish to resolve this. You have 21 days. Failure to do so will commence legal action, obtain judgment and enforce same through due-process remedies afforded by your State. Can include garnishees and/or seizure and sale of assets. Any further communciation will be by a legal representative in your area." Now I know that it's the collection agency's job to intimidate and threaten, but I do know from reading these forums, they do sue occasionally, especially if they think you have the money (shown by fussing over your credit report). Unfortunately, I don't see any violations I could use to leverage. I really can't afford a large lump sum payment the CAs will invariably demand (even if they settle for less). Being put on some payment plan would be difficult as well as I'm already broke after all the bills get paid each month. Don't want to file for bankruptcy. Of course, I don't need a judgment either! I'm about 60,000 in debt (mostly school loans) and have very little assets. Credit score is in the 550 range. However, my wife and I are working full-time, but we have barely enough to pay all the bills. Checked Google and it looks like they do have a couple of cases filed in my area during the past several months. Trying to re-build my credit and a previous mistake from a few years back is biting me in the butt. Should I just hope that they will just give up on me and go after the next target, or do I have a good chance of being sued. What should I do? Am I handling this correctly? Any help appreciated. Thanks! Mr. Anon
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