[privacy] Court Slaps Credit Agency for Ruining Man's Reputation

["Paul Ferguson" <fergdawg () netzero net>]

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Via The San Francisco Chronicle.

[snip]

A federal appeals court has reversed itself and ruled that a Southern
California man's rights were violated by a credit agency that put an
erroneous court filing on his record, refused to change it when he
complained and wrecked his hopes of starting a business.

The Ninth U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in San Francisco had voted 2-1 in
May to dismiss Jason Dennis' lawsuit, saying the credit agency had
conducted an adequate investigation of his case. But on Tuesday, the same
panel, by a 3-0 ruling, not only reinstated the suit but also found the
agency negligent for failing to correct the error.

The court told a federal judge who had previously dismissed the suit to
decide how much Dennis should receive in damages and attorney's fees from
Experian Information Solutions, a credit reporting agency. The court also
said Dennis was entitled to a trial on his claim that Experian failed to
adopt reasonable procedures to assure accurate reporting, which could lead
to additional damages.

"This case illustrates how important it is for Experian, a company that
traffics in the reputations of ordinary people, to train its employees to
understand the legal significance of the documents they rely on," Judge
Alex Kozinski wrote. Kozinski had dissented from the ruling in May, by
Judges Diarmuid O'Scannlain and Carlos Bea, that threw out the lawsuit.

[snip]

More:
http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2007/09/26/BAJ5SEMHR.DTL

- - ferg

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--
"Fergie", a.k.a. Paul Ferguson
 Engineering Architecture for the Internet
 fergdawg(at)netzero.net
 ferg's tech blog: http://fergdawg.blogspot.com/

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