Fake process server calls
Complaint
Quintin L King
Country: United States
I have received numerous calls from this "company", all of which start with a request for address verification for Process serving. Intimations that a law suit has been filed (the Company, to the best of my knowledge is in Florida, I live and own a business in Illinois). What process server doesn't have an address? These people call constantly and wont reveal the name of the entity for which they are collecting unless you "confirm" your address and last four of social. I am formally filing a complaint with the FTC and the Florida Dept of Financial Regulation, but wondered if anyone has had experience with these people?
Comments
Since I have some legal background, please anyone BEWARE.Relate any
information and to collect any data you can to your local authority. Where did this scam originate from and who are the scammers, and more importantly where did they get the phone numbers?
That would also give them information to old names, both on your credit report and through the skip-trace service. Just as they call relatives to pretend they are trying to "locate" you, when they probably have your current address in front of them from your credit report, they may also be using your former last name, to pretend this "debt" is old.
It's a scam.
Get copies of your credit reports, to see if there is a recent inquiry from an unrecognized creditor, possibly claiming to be a collection agency.
It is illegal to pull credit reports without permission, such as this case, where they are pulling them to use in fraud. Federal penalties can be 2 years in prison, on top of other crimes like larceny and wire fraud. SOL is 5 years.
Contact FTC, since they are investigating several similar scams.
Since there are indications from other complaints that this one is in Florida, contact the Florida Attorney General, as well as your state Attorney General.
Since they have your current phone number, even with your old name, and indeed claimed they were going to serve you on 9/16, they already would have your address.
These ones are fake, using a script designed to panic you so you "settle" this fake "debt" to avoid the "lawsuit".
It is all a con.
Okay, so we go through the whole case number bit after which I was told of a pending court action against me. He said 44 days ago a letter was sent to me giving me 30 days to respond, the usual, "We will consider this a valid debt unless..."
So, he tells me Thurston & Associates are a law group (with investors)that buys up debt for the specific purpose to bring suit against them, but they are not debt collectors therefore he didn't feel the need to follow the FDCPA. Shame on him, for their stated purpose they indeed ARE debt collectors.
Well to continue, he seems a little perplexed that I did not receive said "validation letter" (his words) and then wants to know if I HAD received it, would I be willing to take care of this matter without it getting to court.
"Oh heaven's no," I said. "I can't wait to meet you inside of a courtroom, please tell your process server to bring me the summons."
In the end, after I started speaking to him about the law involved in such cases, he hung up on me, telling me to save it for court.
TJ is quite correct here, these people are simply pulling old debt and trying to scare people into settling out of court.
File complaints with the appropriate offices and soon these clowns will be out of business.
At least that's what he answeres today.
"we go through the whole case number bit after which I was told of a pending court action against me."
Want to bet there is no lawsuit filed at your local county courthouse?
Liars.
"He said 44 days ago a letter was sent to me giving me 30 days to respond, the usual, "We will consider this a valid debt unless..." "
Fraudulent debt collectors like to claim that if you don't dispute a debt within 30 days, it's "valid". That is deceptive, as all the FDCPA language says is that they must notify you that THEY may ASSUME it's valid. Courts are the ultimate decider on what is "valid" and what is not. FDCPA also specifically says that NO COURT may consiser a failure to dispute as having ANY effect on whether it is valid or not.
Doesn't sound like you got any letter, either.
Liars.
"he tells me Thurston & Associates are a law group (with investors)that buys up debt for the specific purpose to bring suit against them, "
Why don't you contact the Florida Attorney General, and ask them if they are a "law group".
A bunch of liars.
"they are not debt collectors therefore he didn't feel the need to follow the FDCPA."
ANYONE who collects on allegedly delinquent consumer debt originally owed to another, is by definition, a "debt collector", as defined by FDCPA.
Liars."
"he seems a little perplexed that I did not receive said "validation letter" (his words) "
Why would he be perplexed? You didn't receive it, because they didn't send it. No one else they talked to received it either.
Liars.
"wants to know if I HAD received it, would I be willing to take care of this matter without it getting to court. "
Translation: would you be willing to pay him bucks for a fake "debt" if he just threatens you enough.
"In the end, after I started speaking to him about the law involved in such cases, he hung up on me, telling me to save it for court. "
Court is the last place he wants to appear. If he actually "sued", he wouldn't be using these threats. He wouldn't need to.
It typically involves threats of a "lawsuit", often through calls from an "attorney" or "law firm", or a fake "process server" who often first calls a relative, pretending to be trying to locate you to "serve papers".
The "debts" are generally faked. Sometimes they are crafted to sound like an old account found from pulling your credit report. They may even sound like a debt you actually owe, or once owed, a creditor, but this is easy when they can find the account tradeline on your own credit report.
They are often presented as some old debt that has now grown to thousands, and will cost thousands more if they "sue", for "attorney and court fees".
Typically they offer to "settle" for high hundreds to a few thousand, but only if you agree immediately. (The amount appears to be chosen in the range of what most people could scrape together quickly in a pinch, and is in the same range as common "advance fee" loan scam "fees".)
They never send any proof, at most some "settlement letter" (often by email to avoid U.S. Mail) that proves nothing, but is crafted to let them claim it was just a "mistake" if they get caught.
Consumer complaints indicate these scams are operating from various parts of the country.
Buffalo is home to a number, some of which were caught following the Dateline hidden cammera expose of the Boyland operation a couple years ago.
Florida is also home to some. Jacksonville has long been home to several debt collectors with a record of illegal collection and abuse, and they appear to just change their names when shut down. South Florida may also be home to some, as it is home to a number of fraudulent telemarketing operations.
Illinois, Ohio, and the Atlanta area also show complaints pointing to similar scams operating from those regions.
Southern California is currently home to some of the largest, including one cluster operating out of Corona under more than 50 alias front names, with several similar debt collection scams in the greater Los Angeles area.
Regardless of the location, the illegal tactics are generally as outlined above. These are criminal operations, hiding their identities and locations, and attempting to conduct their schemes under the radar of law enforcement by distributing their activities across victims in many different state jurisdictions, often using multiple aliases.
Deception, illegal threats, abuse, and harassment are indicators of faked "debt", and therefore fraud.
The Indian scammers often have thick accents, and use ridiculous sounding "law enforcement agency" names. Although they may have SSN and bank account information, often from fake "payday loan application" websites that their victims may have applied to, they also often demand payment by Western Union, Moneygram, or even prepaid Walmart debit cards, so they don't appear to have business account access to the payment processing systems that allow direct checking account EFT or credit card charges.
The U.S. scammers appear to have set themselves up as "debt collectors" to the satisfaction of credit reporting agencies, allowing them access to consumer credit reports.
They often also have access to electronic payment processors, so they can extract payment via credit or debit card, or EFT from checking accounts. This may also allow the victim to reverse the charge, if they catch on in time, This may be one reason these scams emphasize threats of possible arrest or prosecution, so that after paying this "settlement", the victim is afraid to dispute through their bank for fear of being "prosecuted".
Frauds are crafted to create a coherent, though distorted, perception, with each element deviating from normal business practice introduced for a specific purpose to further the scheme.
They are counting on the number of complaints traced to each different alias within each state jurisdition being below the thresholds at which FTC or AGs will take any action. They also count on hiding sufficiently to evade lawsuits, by making it difficult to identify them or their assets to the point that it isn't worth a private lawsuit due to the uncertainty of collecting anything.
Similar factors showed up with the Boyland operation exposed on Dateline. They were pretending to be "Maryland police detectives" investigating "bad check fraud" or "bank fraud". In reality, they were in Buffalo, getting their payments through a local Western Union office across the street. It took some investigative work for Dateline to track them down, but until then, there was sufficient confusion that neither Maryland or NY AGs had done anything.
The most traceable identifiers are phone numbers, as they show up in complaint threads on 800notes and similar sites.
What other names and phone numbers are associated with "Thurston"?
Although it is a little soon to get a clear picture of their full operation through consumer complaints, the early appearance of aliases is consistent with how this type of scam is normally run, and indicates that their intent to rely on hiding and deception to get away will illegal threats. That is consistent with a fake "debt collection" racket.
Based on how this type of scam is usually run, you might be contacted by a fake "process server", supposedly as a "reference" or relative, to deliver the threats, or you might be the intended victim yourself.
If you are not the intended victim, most likely you are a relative, but possibly they might have "skip-traced" you as a relative of the victim in error.
If you are the intended victim, you should check your credit reports to see if they illegally pulled one, intending to use information from it to con you. If you find they have pulled your reports, and are using them to try to extort you, file complaints with FTC, your AG, and Florida AG, as that crosses the line into documentable criminal activity.
As you have already found, they could care less whether you report them. They are already counting on their identity hiding to protect them from prosecution, so you cannot expect threats of reporting them to make any difference. The same pattern showed up with Boyland, pretending to be in "Maryland", while they were really in Buffalo.
On the other hand, there is no downside to reporting them to FTC, state AGs, or law enforcement. Only accumulating consumer complaints will get any action. When you stop just threatening, and instead tell them you have actually filed fraud complaints, they will probably move on, as you are no longer a viable sucker.
Yes, i'm positive there is no lawsuit filed at the local courthouse. In the space of a 5 minute conversation, I caught him in so many violations of FDCPA it's not even funny. Well, no it WAS rather funny to be honest.
I know the last place he wants to find himself is in a courtroom, and after the converation I had with this this morning, i'm pretty sure i'll not be hearing from them again.
This post is pretty typical of such shills. It reads practically like an
executive summary or advertisement, including each talking point the writer wants you to believe, such as:
1) "they are legitimate",
2) supposedly he found the debt was delinquent,
3) he "verified" by an account number on some letter he got,
4) you will get sued,
5) it's really expensive to try to oppose this company,
6) this "attorney" supposedly verifies that Thurston is "legitimate",
7) he wished he had settled.
There is no way to verify any of these assertions, including the assertion that this "attorney" verified anything, or even that there ever was an "attorney". (Great "attorney". Takes $1000 just to tell the client to pay a settlement. How many billable hours did that take? Of course, there was no "attorney", as this is just a story.)
Also note the logical inconsistencies, which are an indication of lying. Supposedly the writer is "now facing a court date". Yet later, "not only am i paying the settlement but now i added 1000 bucks to the whole issue for my attorney". Little mistake, that someone reporting on their real experiences would not make.
The writer's "experience" is entirely made up. The details match closely with the goals of what is already reported to be a deceptive scam.
Whenever you find some aspects of deception, you can expect to find others, so look for them. Deceptive "morality play" shill posts routinely show up in connection with deceptive debt collection scams. It's one of the indicators it's all an act.
Lying shill.
This is just a con.
They are running a con.
Nothing made up by any debt collector is proof of anything, expecially when they are already being reported as engaging in deception and threats. This "proof" could easily be fabricated using information obtained from credit reports, and in fact, this type of scam often uses credit reports to obtain information on old accounts to fake the "debt".
Normal validation obtained and sent by an actual legitimate debt collector would be obtained from the original creditor, and then be sent by the debt collector to the consumer. The shill post attempts to distort the requirements of FDCPA validation to the benefit of the scam.