Photo of Virginia Bell Flynn

Virginia is a partner in the firm’s Consumer Financial Services practice and specifically within the Financial Services Litigation practice. She represents clients in federal and state court, both at the trial and appellate level in the areas of complex litigation and business disputes, health care litigation, including ERISA and out-of-network issues, and consumer litigation in over 21 states nationwide. As a result of new legal developments, she increasingly counsels clients to ensure they comply with the myriad of growing laws in the consumer law with a particular emphasis on the intersection of TCPA and HIPAA.

Recently, a U.S. District Court in the District of New Mexico denied a defendant’s motion for summary judgment on Telephone Consumer Protection Act (TCPA) claims for telemarketing calls, finding genuine questions of fact about the defendant’s direct liability, actual authority over agents making the calls, whether the system used to make the calls is an Automatic Telephone Dialing System (ATDS), and whether there is a private right of action under 47 C.F.R. § 64.1200(d)(4). The court granted summary judgment only on claims regarding apparent authority for the agents who called and ratification of the agents’ actions.

As discussed here, on February 15, 2024, the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) approved amendments to the rules and regulations implementing the Telephone Consumer Protection Act (TCPA). These amendments were purportedly aimed at strengthening consumers’ ability to revoke consent to robocalls and robotexts. Last month, the FCC announced that the new rules go into effect on April 11, 2025.

On October 4, the Supreme Court granted certiorari in the case of McLaughlin Chiropractic Associates, Inc. v. McKesson Corporation. This case will address a critical question that has been a point of contention among various circuit courts: whether the Hobbs Act, which limits judicial review of Federal Communications Commission (FCC) “final orders” to appellate courts, requires district courts to accept the FCC legal interpretation of the Telephone Consumer Protection Act (TCPA). While the Supreme Court previously addressed whether the Hobbs Act applied in private litigation, it ultimately did not resolve whether a district court is required to follow a particular FCC order interpreting the TCPA.

On September 19, USTelecom — The Broadband Association (USTelecom), a major telecommunications trade organization, sent a letter to the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) expressing its concerns about the proposed enhancements to anti-robocall regulations. USTelecom’s primary contention is that the proposed rules, which aim to extend the do-not-originate (DNO) requirement, could inadvertently block legitimate calls, including emergency communications. The association argues that the current industry practices already effectively block calls from invalid, unallocated, and unused numbers, as well as numbers on the DNO list managed by the USTelecom-led Industry Traceback Group (ITG).

In Aley v. Lightfire Partners, LLC, a U.S. District Court in the Northern District of New York certified aa Telephone Consumer Protection Act (TCPA) class action for all persons whose telephone numbers were on the National Do Not Call Registry (DNC) but who received more than one telemarketing call from the defendant based on alleged consent given to a third-party website.

On September 9, the U.S. District Court for the District of Nevada granted summary judgment in favor of a debt collector in a case involving alleged violations of the Fair Debt Collection Practices Act (FDCPA) and the Telephone Consumer Protection Act (TCPA) based on phone calls the plaintiff received related to her medical debt.

In a recent ruling, a U.S. District Court for the Central District of California granted a defendant’s motion to dismiss a complaint brought under the Telephone Consumer Protection Act (TCPA). The complaint alleged that the plaintiff received multiple communications from the defendant despite not having provided prior consent and being on the National Do-Not-Call Registry. The court found that the communications were not “solicitations” under the TCPA because the messages were aimed at recruiting the plaintiff for employment and that the complaint insufficiently alleged that the defendant used an automated telephone dialing system (ATDS) or that the voicemail was prerecorded.

The U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit recently dismissed an appeal in the case of Lewis v. Becerra, Secretary of the United States Department of Health and Human Services (HHS). The appellants sought to challenge the district court’s denial of class certification despite having won their individual claims for Medicare reimbursement. The court dismissed the appeal for lack of Article III standing, emphasizing that the appellants did not demonstrate a concrete, individual injury from the denial of class certification.