Sengenberger v. Credit Control Services, Inc.

1 Citing case

  1. Bakov v. Consol. World Travel, Inc.

    Case No. 15 C 2980 (N.D. Ill. Dec. 9, 2019)   Cited 2 times

    Other courts in this District have made rulings on treble damages on which this Court can draw. Courts in this District have ruled that a willful or knowing TCPA violation does not require that the defendant had actual knowledge that an action violated the TCPA, but only that the action itself was intentional. See Newbold v. State Farm Mutual Automobile Insurance Co., 2015 WL 1368554, at *5 (N.D. Ill. Jan. 23, 2015) ("Courts generally have interpreted [willful or knowing] to mean voluntary, intentional, actions, and not to require specific knowledge that the action constitutes a violation of the TCPA."); Bridgeview Health Care Center Ltd. v. Clark, 2013 WL 1154206, at *7 (N.D. Ill. March 19, 2013) ("The Court adopts the more common interpretation that 'willfully' or 'knowingly' simply requires that the act be intentional or volitional, as opposed to inadvertent, and not that defendant must have known that the conduct would violate the statute."); Sengenberger v. Credit Control Services, Inc., 2010 WL 1791270, at *6 (N.D. Ill. May 5, 2010) (no requirement of knowledge that an act violated the TCPA for treble damages); Charvat v. Allstate Corporation, 29 F.Supp.3d 1147, 1151 (N.D. Ill. March 5, 2014) (willful or knowing TCPA violation only requires defendant knew of facts constituting the offense). This Court agrees with other courts in this District: for Defendant to be liable for treble damages in this case, Plaintiffs must demonstrate that Defendant knew that VVT was making its calls intentionally, rather than inadvertently.