Federal Trade Commission v. Global Asset Financial Services Group, LLC

          STIPULATED PRELIMINARY INJUNCTION AS TO DEFENDANTS OMAR HUSSAIN AND CEDAR ROSE HOLDINGS AND DEVELOPMENT, INC.

          GRAHAM C. MULLEN, UNITED STATES DISTRICT JUDGE

         Plaintiff Federal Trade Commission (“FTC”), commenced this civil action on February 4, 2019, pursuant to Section 13(b) of the Federal Trade Commission Act (“FTC Act”), 15 U.S.C. § 53(b), and Section 814(a) of the Fair Debt Collection Practices Act (“FDCPA”), 15 U.S.C. § 1692l(a). On February 4, 2019, on motion by the FTC, the Court entered an ex parte temporary restraining order (“TRO”) with asset freeze, appointment of receiver, and other equitable relief against Defendants Global Asset Financial Services Group, LLC, Regional Asset Maintenance, LLC, 10D Holdings, Inc., Trans America Consumer Solutions, LLC, Midwestern Alliance, LLC, LLI Business Innovations, LLC, TACS I, LLC, TACS II, LLC, TACS III, LLC, Cedar Rose Holdings & Development, Inc., Ankh Ali, Aziza Ali, Kenneth Moody, David Carr, Jeremy Scinta, and Omar Hussain. (ECF No. 5.) Now, the FTC, the Receiver, and Defendants Omar Hussain and Cedar Rose Holdings and Development, Inc., (“Stipulating Defendants”), by and through their undersigned counsel, have stipulated and agreed to the entry of a preliminary injunction (“Order”).

         FINDINGS OF FACT

         By stipulation of the parties, the Court finds that:

1. The FTC and Stipulating Defendants have stipulated and agreed to the entry of this preliminary injunction order without any admission of wrongdoing or violation of law, and without a finding by the Court of law or fact other than stated below.

2. The Stipulating Defendants waive all rights to seek judicial review or otherwise challenge or contest the validity of this Order.

3. The FTC asserts that the Court has jurisdiction over the subject matter of this case, there is good cause to believe it will have jurisdiction over Defendants 4. The FTC asserts that venue in the Western District of North Carolina is proper under 28 U.S.C. § 1391(b) and (c) and 15 U.S.C. § 53(b).

5. The FTC asserts that there is good cause to believe that the Stipulating Defendants have engaged and are likely to continue to engage in acts or practices that violate Section 5(a) of the FTC Act, 15 U.S.C. § 45(a), and the FDCPA, 15 U.S.C. §§ 1692 - 1692p, and that the FTC is therefore likely to prevail on the merits of this action.

6. The FTC asserts that there is good cause to believe that immediate and irreparable harm will result from the Stipulating Defendants' alleged ongoing violations of Section 5(a) of the FTC Act and the FDCPA unless the Stipulating Defendants are immediately restrained and enjoined by Order of this Court.

7. The FTC asserts that there is good cause to believe that immediate and irreparable damage to the Court's ability to grant effective final relief for consumers in the form of monetary restitution and/or disgorgement of ill-gotten gains will occur from the transfer, dissipation, or concealment by the Stipulating Defendants of their assets or business records unless the Stipulating Defendants are immediately restrained and enjoined by Order of this Court.

8. The FTC asserts that good cause exists for continuing the asset freeze over the Stipulating Defendants' assets and for continuing the receivership over the Receivership Entities.

9. The FTC asserts that this order is in the public interest.

10. No security is required of any agency of the United States for issuance of a preliminary injunction, Fed.R.Civ.P. 65(c).

         DEFINITIONS

         For the purpose of this Order, the following definitions shall apply:

         A. “Asset” means any legal or equitable interest in, right to, or claim to, any property, wherever located and by whomever held.

         B. “Consumer” means any person.

         C. “Corporate Defendant(s)” means Defendants Global Asset Financial Services Group, LLC, Regional Asset Maintenance, LLC, 10D Holdings, Inc., Trans America Consumer Solutions, LLC, Midwestern Alliance, LLC, LLI Business Innovations, LLC, TACS I, LLC, TACS II, LLC, TACS III, LLC, Cedar Rose Holdings & Development, Inc., and each of their subsidiaries, affiliates, successors, and assigns.

         D. “Debt” means any obligation or alleged obligation to pay money arising out of a transaction, whether or not such obligation has been reduced to judgment.

         E. “Debt Portfolio” means spreadsheets, databases, tables, lists, or any other compilation of information describing debts or purported debts.

         F. “Defendant(s)” means the Corporate Defendants and the Individual Defendants, individually, collectively, or in any combination.

         G. “Document” is synonymous in meaning and equal in scope to the usage of “document” and “electronically stored information” in Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 34(a), Fed.R.Civ.P. 34(a), and includes writings, drawings, graphs, charts, photographs, sound and video recordings, images, Internet sites, web pages, websites, electronic correspondence, including e-mail and instant messages, contracts, accounting data, advertisements, FTP Logs, Server Access Logs, books, written or printed records, handwritten notes, telephone logs, telephone scripts, receipt books, ledgers, personal and business canceled checks and check registers, bank statements, appointment books, computer records, customer or sales databases and any other electronically stored information, including Documents located on remote servers or cloud computing systems, and other data or data compilations from which information can be obtained directly or, if necessary, after translation into a reasonably usable form. A draft or non-identical copy is a separate document within the meaning of the term.

         H. “Electronic Data Host” means any person or entity in the business of storing, hosting, or otherwise maintaining electronically stored information. This includes, but is not limited to, any entity hosting a website or server, and any entity providing “cloud based” electronic storage.

         I. “Individual Defendant(s)” means Ankh Ali, Aziza Ali, Kenneth Moody, David Carr, Jeremy Scinta, and Omar Hussain, individually, collectively, or in any combination.

         J. “Person” means a natural person, an organization or other legal entity, including a corporation, partnership, sole proprietorship, limited liability company, association, cooperative, or any other group or combination acting as an entity K. “Receiver” means the temporary receiver appointed in Section XI of this Order and any deputy receivers that shall be named by the temporary receiver.

         L. “Receivership Entities” means the Corporate Defendants as well as any other entity that has conducted any business related to Defendants' debt collection or debt brokering, including receipt of Assets derived from any activity that is the subject of the Complaint in this matter, and that the Receiver determines is controlled or owned by any Defendant.

         M. “Stipulating Defendants” means Omar Hussain and Cedar Rose Holdings and Development, Inc. and its successors and assigns, individually, collectively, or in any combination, and each of them by whatever names each might be known.

         ORDER

         I. PROHIBITED REPRESENTATIONS

         IT IS THEREFORE ORDERED that Stipulating Defendants, Stipulating Defendants' officers, agents, employees, and attorneys, and all other persons in active concert or participation with them, who receive actual notice of this Order by personal service or otherwise, whether acting directly or indirectly, in connection with the advertising, marketing, promoting, or offering for sale of any goods or services, are hereby restrained and enjoined from:

         A. Misrepresenting or assisting others in misrepresenting, expressly or by implication, any material fact, including, but not limited to:

1. that any consumer is delinquent on a payday loan or other debt that any Defendant or any other person has authority to collect;

2. that any consumer has a legal obligation to pay any Defendant or any other person;

3. that non-payment of a purported debt will result in a consumer's arrest, criminal prosecution, imprisonment, or in seizure, garnishment, or attachment of a consumer's property or wages;

4. that consumers have committed a fraud or a criminal act;

5. that any Defendant or any other person has taken, intends to take, or has authority to take formal legal action against a consumer who fails to pay any debt;

6. that any Defendant will serve, or arrange for a third party to serve, documents on a consumer;

7. that any Defendant or any other person is an attorney or affiliated or associated with an attorney;

8. that any Defendant or any other person is a law firm; or

9. the character, amount, or legal status of a debt;

         B. Communicating with third parties for purposes other than acquiring location information about a consumer, without having obtained directly the prior consent of the consumer or the express permission of a court of competent jurisdiction, and when not reasonably necessary to effectuate a postjudgment judicial remedy;

         C. Placing telephone calls without meaningfully disclosing the caller's identity;

         D. Failing to disclose or disclose adequately (1) in the initial communication with a consumer that any Defendant or any other person is a debt collector attempting to collect a debt and that any information obtained will be used for that purpose, or (2) in subsequent communications with consumers that any Defendant or any other person is a debt collector;

         E. Threatening to take action that is not lawful or that any Defendant or any other person does not intend to take;

         F. Using any false representation or deceptive means to collect or attempt to collect a debt, or to obtain information concerning a consumer;

         G. Using a business, company, or organization name other than the true name of Defendants' business, company, or organization;

         H. Failing to provide consumers, within five days after the initial communication with a consumer, a written notice containing: (1) the amount of the debt; (2) the name of the creditor to whom the debt is owed; (3) a statement that unless the consumer, within thirty days after receipt of the notice, disputes the validity of the debt, or any portion thereof, the debt will be assumed to be valid by Defendants; (4) a statement that if the consumer notifies Defendants in writing within the thirty-day period that the debt, or any portion thereof, is disputed, Defendants will obtain verification of the debt or a copy of a judgment against the consumer and a copy of such verification or judgment will be mailed to the consumer by Defendants; and (5) a statement that, upon the consumer's written request within the thirty-day period, Defendants will provide the consumer with the name and address of the original creditor, if different from the current creditor;

         I. Marketing, distributing, or selling Debt Portfolios that list loans that the lenders have not, in fact, made to the consumers identified in such portfolios, or Debts that Defendants do not have the right to collect;

         J. Providing others with the means and instrumentalities to misrepresent, or assist others in misrepresenting, directly or indirectly, expressly or by implication, that consumers owe debts or that a debt collector has obtained the rights to collect from a consumer; and

         K. Engaging in any conduct that violates the FDCPA, 15 U.S.C. §§ 1692-1692p.

         II. PROHIBITION ON RELEASE OF CUSTOMER INFORMATION

         IT IS FURTHER ORDERED that the Stipulating Defendants, and their officers, agents, employees, and attorneys, and all other persons in active concert or participation with any of them, who receive actual notice of this Order, whether acting directly or indirectly, are hereby restrained and enjoined from:

A. Selling, renting, leasing, transferring, or otherwise disclosing, the name, address, birth date, telephone number, email address, credit card number, bank account number, Social Security number, or other financial or identifying information of any person that any Defendant obtained in connection with any activity that pertains to the subject matter of this Order; and

B. Benefitting from or using the name, address, birth date, telephone number, email address, credit card number, bank account number, Social Security number, or other financial or identifying information of any person that any Defendant obtained in connection with any activity that pertains to the subject matter of this Order.

C. Provided, however, that Stipulating Defendants may disclose such identifying information to a law enforcement agency, to their attorneys as required for their defense, as required by any law, regulation, or court order, or in any filings, pleadings or discovery in this action in the manner required by the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure and by any protective order in the case.

         III. ACCOUNTING FOR DEBT PORTFOLIOS AND CHAINS OF TITLE

         IT IS FURTHER ORDERED that Stipulating Defendants, within ten (10) business days of entry of this ...