Consumer Actions
The tort system of the past 40 years was a result of the industrial age. The Industrial Revolution, which spawned a way of life based on employer-employee relations, gave rise to labor exploitation, industrial injuries, and today’s tort system. Today, we have entered a new Information Age. Consumer exploitation has replaced labor exploitation as the problem of our times.
Mississippi is a prime location for consumer fraud. [See, for example, "MERCHANTS OF MISERY: How Corporate America Profits for Poverty." by Michael Hudson (Common Courage Press, 1996) discussing "the poverty industry," including how corporations profit in lower socio-economic climes from predatory business practices in fields such as consumer lending, pawnshops and check cashers, rent-to-own businesses, forced place insurance, trade school scams, and home-loan rip-offs.]
Predatory business practices and consumer fraud now touch every socio-economic group. See, for example, sweepstakes fraud, bank overdraft cases, and deceptive insurance cases. Smith Phillips has handled fraudulent sales practices cases involving sophisticated purchasers of life insurance policies with face values as large as $10 million with annual premiums as large as $146,000.
Consumer fraud litigation is a major focus of today’s litigation at Smith Phillips Mitchell Scott & Nowak. The firm is handling a number of consumer cases on individual, class action, and "mass action" basis. Examples include cases on behalf of approximate 80 borrowers from finance companies for deceptive lending practices.
Attorneys in the firm, including Richard T. Phillips, are active in the National Association of Consumer Advocates (NACA). Visit NACA website for detailed information on cases handled by the National Association of Consumer Advocatess.
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