Van Connor v. One Life Am., Inc.

• Decision Date: 29 June 2021
• Docket Number: C/A No. 6:19-cv-03283-DCC
• Citation: 546 F.Supp.3d 458
• Parties: James VAN CONNOR, individually and on behalf of a class of all persons and entities similarly situated, Plaintiff, v. ONE LIFE AMERICA, INC.; Independent Order of Foresters; Mark Adams; and Niche Market Insurers Agency, Inc., Defendants.
• Court: U.S. District Court — District of South Carolina

546 F.Supp.3d 458

James VAN CONNOR, individually and on behalf of a class of all persons and entities similarly situated, Plaintiff,

v.ONE LIFE AMERICA, INC.; Independent Order of Foresters; Mark Adams; and Niche Market Insurers Agency, Inc., Defendants.

C/A No. 6:19-cv-03283-DCC

United States District Court, D. South Carolina, Greenville Division.

Signed June 29, 2021

David Andrew Maxfield, David Maxfield Attorney LLC, Columbia, SC, Anthony Ilo Paronich, Pro Hac Vice, Paronich Law PC, Hingham, MA, Brian Kevin Murphy, Pro Hac Vice, Jonathan Patrick Misny, Pro Hac Vice, Murray Murphy Moul and Basil LLP, Columbus, OH, for Plaintiff.

Christopher Lee Boguski, Joseph Calhoun Watson, Robinson Gray Stepp and Laffitte LLC, Columbia, SC, Bernard Allen Garner, Pro Hac Vice, Allen Garner Law LLC, Independence, MO, for Defendant One Life America Inc.

Chadwick S. Devlin, Don Lawrence Kristinik, III, Nelson Mullins Riley and Scarborough LLP, Columbia, SC, for Defendant Independent Order of Foresters.

Edward Fadel, Pro Hac Vice, Flannery Georgalis LLC, Cleveland, OH, John Gwilym Tamasitis, Parker Poe Adams & Bernstein, Columbia, SC, David A. Brown, Sr., Pro Hac Vice, Elizabeth F. Greene, Pro Hac Vice, Flannery Georgalis LLC, Charlotte, NC, Lawrence Michael Hershon, The Hershon Law Firm PA, Charleston, SC, for Defendant Mark Adams.

Larry Lee Plumblee, Brace King Plumblee, Eppes and Plumblee, Greenville, SC, for Defendant Niche Market Insurers Agency, Inc.

OPINION AND ORDER

Donald C. Coggins, Jr., United States District Judge This matter is before the Court on the three Motions to Dismiss filed by Defendants Independent Order of Foresters, One Life America, Inc., and Mark Adams (collectively, "the moving Defendants"). ECF Nos. 104, 106, 109. For the reasons that follow, the Motions are denied.

BACKGROUND

Plaintiff brings this action pursuant to the Telephone Consumer Protection Act ("TCPA"), 47 U.S.C. § 227, which makes it unlawful for any person to make automated, artificial or prerecorded calls ("robocalls") to cell phones or residential phone lines. Id. §§ 227(b)(1)(A)(iii), 227(b)(1)(B). Plaintiff alleges that on July 23, 2019, Defendant Mark Adams called his cell phone with a pre-recorded message regarding Defendant Independent Order of Foresters’ ("Foresters") insurance services. ECF No. 41 ¶¶ 28–37. Plaintiff further alleges that Defendant Foresters contracted with Defendant One Life America, Inc. ("One Life") to sell insurance on its behalf; that One Life partnered with Defendant Niche Market Insurers Agency, Inc. ("Niche Market") to carry out its arrangement with Foresters; and that Niche did so by using Defendant Adams to make pre-recorded phone calls. Id. ¶¶ 15–16, 47–57.

Defendants Foresters, One Life, and Adams have filed substantively similar Motions to Dismiss on the basis that the robocall restriction, § 227(b)(1)(A), was unconstitutional and therefore invalid during the relevant time period. ECF Nos. 104, 106, 109. Plaintiff Van Connor ("Plaintiff") filed responses in opposition, and the moving Defendants filed replies. ECF Nos. 108, 112, 117, 118, 120. Pursuant to Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 5.1(c), the United States of America intervened and filed a brief in defense of the constitutionality of the challenged statute. ECF Nos. 140. The moving Defendants filed further replies. ECF Nos. 154, 155, 156. Defendants’ Motions are now before the Court.

APPLICABLE LAW

Motion to Dismiss for Lack of Subject Matter Jurisdiction

A party may move for dismissal based on lack of subject matter jurisdiction under Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 12(b)(1). A defendant may challenge subject matter jurisdiction in one of two ways: (1) a facial attack, which asserts that the complaint "fails to allege sufficient facts to support subject matter jurisdiction," or (2) a factual attack, which "challenges the veracity of the facts underpinning subject matter jurisdiction." Kerns v. United States , 585 F.3d 187, 192–93 (4th Cir. 2009). Where, as here, the defendant challenges jurisdiction based on the facts alleged in the complaint, the court "must apply a standard patterned on Rule 12(b)(6) and assume the truthfulness of the facts alleged." Id. at 193.

Motion for Judgment on the Pleadings

Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 12(c) provides that "[a]fter the pleadings are closed—but early enough not to delay trial—a party may move for judgment on the pleadings." Fed. R. Civ. P. 12(c). "[A] motion for judgment on the pleadings is decided under the same standard as a motion to dismiss under Rule 12(b)(6)." Deutsche Bank Nat'l Trust Co. v. IRS , 361 F. App'x. 527, 529 (4th Cir. 2010) (citing Independence News, Inc. v. City of Charlotte , 568 F.3d 148, 154 (4th Cir. 2009) ). The key difference between a Rule 12(b)(6) motion and a Rule 12(c) motion is that on a 12(c) motion, the court "consider[s] the answer as well as the complaint" and "documents incorporated by reference in the pleadings." Fitchett v. Cty. of Horry, S.C. , C/A No. 4:10-cv-1648-TLW-TER, 2011 WL 4435756, at *3 (D.S.C. Aug. 10, 2011) (citations omitted).

Under the Rule 12(b)(6) standard, the court is obligated "to assume the truth of all facts alleged in the complaint and the existence of any fact that can be proved, consistent with the complaint's allegations." E. Shore Mkts., Inc. v. J.D. Assocs. Ltd. P'ship , 213 F.3d 175, 180 (4th Cir. 2000). To survive the motion to dismiss, the complaint must state "enough facts to state a claim to relief that is plausible on its face." Bell Atl. Corp. v. Twombly , 550 U.S. 544, 570, 127 S.Ct. 1955, 167 L.Ed.2d 929 (2007). While the Court must accept the facts in the light most favorable to the nonmoving party, it "need not accept as true unwarranted inferences, unreasonable conclusions, or arguments." Id.

DISCUSSION

I. The Supreme Court's Holding in AAPC

The TCPA, as originally enacted in 1991, "prohibited ‘any call (other than a call made for emergency purposes or made with the prior express consent of the called party) using any automatic telephone dialing system or an artificial or prerecorded voice’ to ‘any telephone number assigned to a ... cellular telephone service[.]’ " Barr v. American Association of Political Consultants, Inc. ("AAPC "), ––– U.S. ––––, 140 S. Ct. 2335, 2344, 207 L.Ed.2d 784 (2020). It was amended in 2015 to exclude from the general restriction calls "made solely to collect a debt owed to or guaranteed by the United States." Bipartisan Budget Act of 2015, Pub. L. 114-74, 129 Stat. 588.

On July 6, 2020, the United States Supreme Court struck down the 2015 government-debt exception as unconstitutional and severed it from the remainder of the TCPA. AAPC , 140 S. Ct. at 2344. Justice Kavanaugh, joined by Chief Justice Roberts and Justice Alito, delivered the plurality opinion of the Court. In total, six Justices concurred in the finding that the government-debt exception violated the First Amendment by impermissibly favoring debt-collection speech over political and other speech. Id. at 2343. Seven Justices agreed that the 2015 government-debt exception was severable and that the entire 1991 robocall restriction should not be invalidated. Id.

II. The Parties’ Positions

All parties to the present Motions agree that the TCPA was constitutional and effective prior to the 2015 amendment. They further agree that, from the date of the Supreme Court's ruling onward, robocallers are clearly liable under the un-severed provisions of the TCPA. They disagree, however, about the effect of the AAPC ruling in the interim. The moving Defendants’ position is that the entirety of § 227(b)(1)(A) was unconstitutional and invalid during the period between November 2, 2015 (when the amendment was enacted) and July 6, 2020 (when the Supreme Court announced its decision that the amendment was severable). Conversely, Plaintiff and Intervenor United States assert that the government-debt exception was simply void ab initio and that the unamended version of the statute remained continuously valid and in force. Under their view, robocallers who were not collecting government debt¹ remain liable for their prohibited actions from 2015 through 2020.

Because the single alleged robocall in this case was placed on July 23, 2019, and Plaintiff's only claim is based on § 227(b)(1)(A), the survival of the action in its entirety depends on the resolution of this question.

III. Retroactive Effect of Severing the Government-Debt Exception

As an initial matter, the moving Defendants’ position is explicitly rejected by a footnote of the three-Justice plurality opinion in AAPC , which states:

As the Government acknowledges, although our decision means the end of the government-debt exception, no one should be penalized or held liable for making robocalls to collect government debt after the effective date of the 2015 government-debt exception and before the entry of final judgment by the District Court on remand in this case, or such date that the lower courts determine is appropriate. On the other side of the ledger, our decision today does not negate the liability of parties who made robocalls covered by the robocall restriction.

140 S. Ct. at 2355 n.12 (emphasis added). None of the additional four Justices who concurred in the severability holding addressed this point. And the notion that parties who made robocalls covered by the restriction are liable for their conduct between 2015 and 2020, regardless of when the Supreme Court issued its ruling, is consistent with the principle that "an unconstitutional statutory amendment ‘is a nullity’ and ‘void’ when enacted, and for that reason has no effect on the original statute." Id. at 2353 (citing Frost v. Corp. Comm'n of Okla. , 278 U.S. 515, 526–27, 49 S.Ct. 235, 73 L.Ed. 483 (1929) ); see also Rivers v. Roadway Express , 511 U.S. 298, 313 n.12, 114 S.Ct. 1510, 128 L.Ed.2d 274 (1994) (explaining that a Supreme Court decision does not change the meaning of a statute, but rather determines what it has "always meant")....