Lansing, MI - Michigan Attorney General Dana Nessel has asked the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of Texas to take stronger action against John Caldwell Spiller II after Spiller violated permanent robocall and telemarketing bans.
Nessel filed alongside seven other state attorneys general represented on the original March 2023 judgment against Spiller for directing billions of illegal robocalls to people across the country. In 2019 alone, Spiller and his co-defendants bombarded Michigan consumers with more than 42 million robocalls – including more than 19 million calls to people whose numbers were on the Do Not Call Registry.
“Mr. Spiller has completely ignored and connived to circumvent the existing court orders preventing him from operating as a robocaller in Michigan,” said Nessel. "So, we are asking the Court to strike decisively against his capacities to harass people all across the country with his deceptive robocalls.”
In March 2023, Attorney General Nessel obtained judgments shutting down a massive robocall operation involving Spiller and other defendants. As part of the judgment, Spiller was banned from making robocalls or engaging in telemarketing. But despite this permanent injunction, Spiller continued to harass people by making deceptive and abusive robocalls and by helping others make these calls.
Spiller used aliases and falsified business records filed in various states and with the Federal Communications Commission to continue conducting this illegal business. Further, since the attorneys general sued him and his co-defendants, Spiller has set up at least three new businesses through which he engaged in telemarketing and facilitated robocalls.
Because he violated these bans on robocalling and telemarketing, Nessel and a coalition of seven attorneys general are asking the court to ban Spiller from engaging in all telephone-related services, not just robocalling and telemarketing. That includes transmitting telephone calls over the U.S. telephone network, providing any VoIP services, engaging in text messaging services, and originating or facilitating ringless voicemail messages or any other electronic messages.
The attorneys general are asking that the court order Spiller to dissolve his existing telephone service companies. They also ask that Spiller be ordered to pay $122,339,320 – the amount that would have otherwise been suspended if Spiller had followed the rules of the permanent injunction and the court’s order. Since he failed to do so, he is obligated to pay the full amount.
AG Nessel is joined in filing this motion by the Attorneys General of Arkansas, Indiana, Missouri, North Carolina, North Dakota, Ohio, and Texas.
A copy of the motion is available here.
See: AG Nessel Shuts Down Texas-Based Robocallers (March 08, 2023)