Legal Library: Cases and Proceedings

Announced in June 2019 as part of a crackdown on illegal robocalls against operations around the country responsible for more than one billion calls, the FTC’s complaint against Derek Jason Bartoli alleges the Florida-based defendant has been an active participant in the illegal telemarketing industry for several years, serving as the “dialer,” “information technology (IT) guy,” and at times the seller for various telemarketing companies, including companies that the FTC and other law enforcement agencies have sued. He provided services in his own name and in the names of Phoenix Innovative Solutions LLC, Marketing Consultation Solutions LLC, and KimRain Marketing LLC.

Canon Inc. and Toshiba Corporation have agreed to settle Federal Trade Commission charges that the companies violated the premerger notification and waiting period requirements of the Hart-Scott-Rodino Act, or HSR Act, when Canon acquired Toshiba Medical Systems Corporation from Toshiba in 2016.

The FTC today announced its first case challenging a marketer’s use of fake paid reviews on an independent retail website. In settling the agency’s complaint, Cure Encapsulations, Inc. and its owner, Naftula Jacobowitz, resolved allegations that they made false and unsubstantiated claims for their garcinia cambogia weight-loss supplement and that they paid a third-party website to write and post fake reviews on Amazon.com.

The FTC issued an administrative complaint (and authorized staff to seek a TRO and PI which have not been filed) challenging the merger of two top suppliers of chloride process titanium dioxide (TiO2), a white pigment used in a wide variety of products including paint, industrial coatings, plastic, and paper. The FTC’s administrative complaint charges that Tronox Limited’s proposed acquisition of competitor Cristal, for $1.67 billion and a 24 percent stake in the combined entity, would violate the antitrust laws by significantly reducing competition in the North American market (comprised of the United States and Canada) for chloride process titanium dioxide. The FTC alleges that the acquisition, if consummated, would increase the risk of coordinated action among the remaining competitors, and increase the risk of future anticompetitive output reductions by Tronox.

The FTC is mailing 305 checks totaling $314,945 to consumers who paid up-front for worthless credit card interest rate reduction programs pitched by Payless Solutions using illegal robocalls.

The operators of two purported sham charities have agreed to settle charges by the FTC and the AGs of Missouri and Florida that they deceived donors with false claims that their organizations helped disabled police officers and military veterans. The operators of both schemes are permanently banned from charitable solicitations or otherwise working for charities.

The FTC is mailing 270 checks totaling nearly $515,000 to consumers who paid for what the agency alleged was deceptively advertised “amniotic stem cell therapy” between 2014 and 2017. The average amount each consumer will receive is $1,907.

Repair All PC settled allegations that it operated a computer tech support scam that tricked consumers into believing their computers were infected with viruses and malware, and then charged them hundreds of dollars for unnecessary repairs.