CASCADE CAPITAL WAGE GARNISHMENT WITH FORSTER AND GARBUS

Recently a consumer contacted us because she received an income execution notice from the Marshal informing her that there was a judgment against her for $12,000 from a decade ago and that her wages would be garnished within 20 days. She was an easy target for wage garnishment because she has a city job. She quickly learned that the judgment against her was obtained by Cascade Capital, a frequent debt-buyer. She had never heard of them nor remembered what debt they may have acquired. She noticed that Cascade Capital was being represented by Forster and Garbus, a large New York and New Jersey debt collection law firm. She was extremely concerned as she had never known about the original lawsuit against her and was worried that the judgment interest accruing at 9% would mean that she would likely pay over $14,000 or more in total.

We immediately obtained the court file in this matter and learned that an extremely old address once associated with our client had been served in this matter. The reasoning for why the consumer had never known about the lawsuit was now very clear. We then filed an Order to Show Cause to vacate the default judgment and to stay the judgment enforcement proceeding. This means that the wage garnishment was put on hold while the judgment issue was decided. We also asked the court to dismiss the case entirely based on standing, privity and hearsay grounds as we did not believe that Cascade Capital would be able to prove that they were the rightful owners of this debt. The judge ordered a traverse hearing to decide whether service was ever properly made. Process servers in New York are notoriously bad and often do not even show to these hearings. Forster and Garbus contacted us shortly thereafter to settle the matter outside of court. Our client agreed and saved herself over 70% off of the alleged debt. The judgment was also vacated so that it would not affect her credit in the future.