BOSTON (Legal Newsline) — Massachusetts Attorney General Maura Healey announced on July 13 that Robert R. White and his law firm Levy & White have been barred by a Middlesex Superior Court from threatening consumers with arrest or imprisonment for not paying small debts.
The preliminary injunction additionally bars the defendants from using the words “jail,” “imprisonment,” “incarceration,” “prison” or “arrest” in any communications with consumers.
White, a debt collection attorney, allegedly has filed close to 2,000 small claims cases in the Small Claims Session of the Lowell District Court since 2012. Healey’s office claims that White routinely intimidated, harassed and abused consumers when trying to get them to pay off small debts.
“This attorney’s unlawful debt collection practices caused financial and emotional injury to consumers and deprived consumers of their right to a fair hearing,” Healey said. “With this injunction, he will no longer be able to abuse consumers and the court system.”
Handling the case for the state are assistant attorneys general Brendan Jarboe, Benjamin Golden and Samantha Shusterman of Healey’s Consumer Protection Division, paralegal Gabrielle Crossnoe and investigators Kristen Salera and Colleen Frost of the Civil Investigations Division.