SCOTUS Rules Against Plaintiffs Branded by Credit Agencies with 'Scarlet Letter of Our Time'; Thomas

[Calista241]

Source: Law & Crime

SCOTUS Rules Against Plaintiffs Branded by Credit Agencies with ‘Scarlet Letter of Our Time’; Thomas Joins Liberals to Dissent

The U.S. Supreme Court ruled 5 to 4 Friday against thousands of plaintiffs whose names were incorrectly identified by credit-reporting agencies as potential criminals. The justices held that the plaintiffs had not suffered sufficiently concrete harms to support Article III standing — in other words, they could not redress their grievances in federal court.

The case is TransUnion v. Ramirez, and it is a class action lawsuit against the credit reporting giant TransUnion over the agency’s misuse of a government list of suspected criminals. The Treasury Department’s Office of Foreign Assets Control (OFAC) creates a list of known and suspected terrorists, drug traffickers and other high-profile criminals—all of whom are prohibited from participating in the U.S. financial system.

A group of plaintiffs sued TransUnion claiming that it falsely labeled 8,185 U.S. citizens as terrorists. The lead plaintiff was Sergio Ramirez, who, while attempting to purchase a car from a Nissan dealership, was told in front of his family that his name was on a list of suspected terrorists. TranUnion appealed to the Supreme Court, arguing that he and other plaintiffs lacked the legal right to bring the lawsuit because they had suffered no actual harm.

...

Kavanaugh’s opinion was joined by Chief Justice John Roberts and Justices Samuel Alito, Neil Gorsuch, and Amy Coney Barrett. The Court ruled that Ramirez and the other 8000+ plaintiffs had no Article III standing to wage a lawsuit, because the class had not suffered the physical, monetary, or reputational harm necessary to support a federal lawsuit.

Read more: https://lawandcrime.com/supreme-court/scotus-rules-against-plaintiffs-branded-by-credit-agencies-with-scarlet-letter-of-our-time-thomas-joins-liberals-to-dissent/

[Dawson Leery]

1. 5 Corporate sluts!

[GregariousGroundhog]

3. This is actually a pretty narrow ruling and not that bad

Of the 8,185 plaintiffs, TransUnion provided credit reports to various entities for 1,853 of those plaintiffs. The Supreme Court stated that those 1,853 plaintiffs have standing to sue and that the other 6,332 plaintiffs were not defamed because TransUnion never reported the incorrect information to anyone.

[reACTIONary]

10. Thanks. From the posted excerpts....

... that's what I gathered. The class has no standing but the affected individuals do.

[Griefbird]

12. How is it that the 6332 were added to the class?

[mdbl]

18. Lawyers probably thought the more the merrier

just a hunch.

[catrose]

2. Considering the fit Kegs threw during his hearing about the terrible things said about him in front

of his family, I'm surprised he thinks this guy suffered nothing.

No I'm not.

[Dr. Strange]

4. Why is the focus on TransUnion?

The lead plaintiff was Sergio Ramirez, who, while attempting to purchase a car from a Nissan dealership, was told in front of his family that his name was on a list of suspected terrorists.

Wasn't that objectively true? And wasn't that list created by the government? Seems like that should be the focus.

[Bernardo de La Paz]

6. See Post #3. Ramirez and over a thousand others can still sue. Simply that the wrong class sued. nt

[Hugh_Lebowski]

9. Transunion might've incorrectly used the official list ... simply doing name-matching or the like

And failing to match on an actually appropriate number of data points.

You know, like RePuQ states like to do their voter purges incorrectly?

I sorta doubt actual/real terrorists and drug kingpins are suing.

[Dr. Strange]

15. Ah.

So, they got a name and connected it to the wrong person instead of the government doing it.

Still seems weird that companies are getting access to these lists.

[Hugh_Lebowski]

16. Just a guess but seems possible :)

And yeah ... does seem weird ... I don't see how credit reporting agencies should have it.

I'd think like the lending agents (i.e. banks) themselves would decline to issue the loans but the credit reporting companies wouldn't know shit.

Maybe the government figures these few reporting agencies are a good 'choke point' to use that way all the banks don't have to have all the info?

[lark]

5. Thomas didn't join the other rabid right wingers? That's very surprising.

This ruling is total bullshit.

[Bernardo de La Paz]

7. Have you read the ruling? Or sped-read news reports?

I've sped-read news reports sometimes and embarrassed myself similarly.

From the article (not the excerpt, the article, emphasis added):

The five-member majority did find that a subset of 1853 class members had suffered concrete injuries when their credit reports were shared with third-party businesses without authorization. Likening their injuries to defamation, the Court found that those victims did indeed have standing to sue.

[Hugh_Lebowski]

8. Excellent, thanks ... Facts are always good (nt)

[reACTIONary]

11. Thanks..

... as stated above, facts are good.

[oldsoftie]

13. Thomas sides with the liberal wing. Wow.

Rarely hear that on a losing decision.
Its been an odd SCOTUS year

[Polybius]

17. So rare it happened the other day too

[Still Sensible]

14. Can't pass up a rare opportunity to say that I agree with Clarence Thomas

I figured Hell would freeze first!

It seems to me that the plaintiffs were "harmed" the instant their name was on any such list that did NOT provide enough additional specifics (picture? SSN? address? DOB?, etc.) to distinguish between the actual suspected terrorists and these similarly-named folks.

Scarlet Letter indeed!

[Joinfortmill]

19. Not sure I would agree if I found my name on that list.