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On April 3rd, Balam Letona, a 2003 Santa Clara Law alum, secured a $500,000 jury verdict in a debt collection harassment trial. The award is one of the highest ever reported for such a case.
The plaintiffs, Manuel and Luz Fausto, sought the help of the Watsonville Law Center in 2006 and 2007 to try to help stop a barrage of harassing phone calls. The calls were from a debt collector in regards to an eight-year- old disputed credit card debt. The Watsonville Law Center, incidentally, was founded by another SCU- Law alum, Dori Rose Inda, ’00.
When the debt collector refused to cease communications, Letona filed suit on the couple’s behalf. Together with San Jose attorney Ronald Wilcox, Letona was able to establish violations of the Federal Fair Debt Collection Practices Act (FDCPA). The FDCPA requires debt collectors to cease collection communications when they receive a written request from a consumer to do so. Letona established that the defendant placed over ninety collection calls to the plaintiffs after receiving the Faustos’ ‘no contact’ letter. In addition, Letona established that the defendants willfully ignored problems with their cease-communication process, despite repeated warnings from employees that the process was deficient. After a three-week trial, the jury returned the half-million dollar verdict, which included $400,000 in punitive damages. Oklahoma attorneys Luke Wallace and Dave Humphries assisted with the trial. "It gave me great satisfaction to help vindicate the Fautos’ rights” said Letona of the Spanish-speaking Gonzales residents.
While at SCU, Letona was a student at the Katharine and George Alexander Community Law Center (KGACLC), where he represented low-income residents in consumer disputes. Letona credited his time at the KGACLC as his source of inspiration to focus on consumer law after graduation from Santa Clara. "I hope collectors around the country will take notice of this verdict” said Letona "and spare consumers from the kind of grief the Faustos had to endure”.
