AG sues Electronic Freedom Fund for anti-Hill robocalls

An article from Mary Beth Schneider indicates that Attorney General Steve Carter  has sued a California-based group called the “Electronic Freedom Fund” for automated phone calls attacking IN-09 Democratic Congressional candidate Baron Hill.

The group has apparently agreed to stop making the calls, but Carter has said that the State will continue to seek an injunction against the “Electronic Freedom Fund” in a Brown County Court. Carter says that the group said that their vendor said that the calls were “legal so long as they were placed from out of state.” Where they got that, I don’t know. The relevant statute is IC 24-5-14 which states:

A caller may not use or connect to a telephone line an automatic dialing-announcing device unless:
(1) the subscriber has knowingly or voluntarily requested, consented to, permitted, or authorized receipt of the message; or
(2) the message is immediately preceded by a live operator who obtains the subscriber’s consent before the message is delivered.

Violating the law constitutes a deceptive act under IC 24-5-0.5 which means that the attorney general can bring an action. An individual subjected to the violation may also bring suit personally and cash in a little bit. But, if the Attorney General decides to be hard core about this, he could really bring some cash into the State’s coffers under IC 24-5-0.5-8:

Sec. 8. A person who commits an incurable deceptive act is subject to a civil penalty of a fine of not more than five hundred dollars ($500) for each violation. The attorney general, acting in the name of the state, has the exclusive right to petition for recovery of such a fine, and this fine may be recovered only in an action brought under section 4(c) of this chapter.

In the definitions section, we find that “‘Incurable deceptive act’ means a deceptive act done by a supplier as part of a scheme, artifice, or device with intent to defraud or mislead.”

I’d say there is a pretty strong argument to be made that the calls were intended to mislead voters about Baron Hill’s voting record. For example, I’d be surprised if a court would agree that the “Electronic Freedom Fund” was accurately characterizing Hill’s voting record when they state that “Baron Hill voted to allow the sale of a broad range of violent and sexually explicit material to minors.”

I haven’t heard how many automated calls were made, but it wouldn’t take long before $500 per call started adding up to some real money, even for an organization bankrolled by Bob Perry, the Houston millionaire responsible for the “Swiftboat Veterans For Truth” lies about John Kerry’s military record that caused Kerry so much trouble when he was running against George Bush.