DENVER (Legal Newsline) -- Colorado Attorney General John Suthers announced Wednesday a civil lawsuit and a temporary restraining order against several magazine telemarketing companies and their owners for allegedly charging consumers for subscriptions they did not order.
Magazine Man, C&R Marketing and Associates LLC, Subscription Solutions, Publications@Mile High and their operators, Raymond Jones Jr. and Cora Jones, allegedly bought lists of consumers who were already receiving magazines, called the consumers and pretended to be the company providing their magazines.
The Joneses allegedly told consumers they were calling to verify and update the consumers' accounts, and deceived the consumers into disclosing or confirming confidential financial information.
The order will temporarily stop the Joneses and their companies from operating.
"The Joneses and their companies must immediately cease telemarketing magazines and their bank accounts are now frozen," Suthers said in a statement.
The Joneses also allegedly tricked consumers into a recorded verification that was used for a bogus oral contract for up to $1,300 worth of magazines, aggressively attempted to collect on the fake contracts, including threatening to report negative information about the consumers to credit reporting agencies, and charged consumers a $350 cancellation fee when the consumers tried to cancel the non-existent contracts.
The Joneses had no affiliation with companies providing the consumers' magazines and allegedly charged the consumers the cancellation fee despite having no ability to cancel the consumers' orders.
"They simply took the money," Suthers said.