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Violation Tracker Individual Record

Company: Freedom Stores, Inc., Freedom Acceptance Corporation, and Military Credit Services LLC
Penalty: $2,600,000
Year: 2014
Date: December 18, 2014
Offense Group: consumer-protection-related offenses
Primary Offense: consumer protection violation
Secondary Offense: debt collection abuses
Violation Description: The Consumer Financial Protection Bureau and the Attorneys General of North Carolina and Virginia took action to protect military servicemembers from allegedly illegal debt collection practices. The CFPB alleged that Freedom Stores, Inc., Freedom Acceptance Corporation, and Military Credit Services LLC used illegal tactics to collect debts, including filing illegal lawsuits, debiting consumers' accounts without authorization, and contacting servicemembers' commanding officers. The CFPB and the states filed a consent order in federal court to require the three companies and their owners and chief officers, John Melley and Leonard Melley, Jr. to provide over $2.5 million in consumer redress and to pay a $100,000 civil penalty.
Level of Government: federal
Action Type: agency action
Agency: Consumer Financial Protection Bureau
Civil or Criminal Case: civil
Source of Data: (click here)
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Current parent company note: Parent-subsidiary relationship is current as of the most recent revision listed in the Update Log.