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In a unanimous opinion written by Justice Neil M. Gorsuch, the Supreme Court ruled yesterday that someone who purchases a defaulted debt is not a “debt collector” and is therefore not subject to the federal Fair Debt Collection Practices Act (FDCPA), according to a special analysis from ABI’s Bill Rochelle. The case, Henson v. Santander Consumer USA Inc., was argued on April 18, the second day Justice Gorsuch sat on the bench after being sworn in the week before as the high court’s 113th justice. Santander had purchased a portfolio of defaulted auto loans from a bank. The district court and the Fourth Circuit both held that Santander was not a “debt collector” and thus not subject to the regulations and remedies afforded to consumers under the FDCPA. The Supreme Court granted certiorari to resolve a split because other circuits had held that purchasing debt did not give a debt collector immunity from the FDCPA.

As her collection of troubled companies continues to struggle, distressed investing executive Lynn Tilton will face questioning under oath about the demise of one of them, failed emergency-care transport company Transcare Corp., the Wall Street Journal reported today. Over the past year, Tilton has gone to trial in New York and Delaware over her handling of what was once a $2.5 billion empire, spending days on the witness stand. Sometime this summer, Tilton will take questions about the fate of Transcare, which shut down suddenly last year, leaving more than 1,200 workers jobless, and many allegedly unpaid. The questions will come from bankruptcy trustees, who have been issuing subpoenas and getting court orders to fill in the gaps in the ambulance company’s financial records. More than a year after Transcare closed down, bank and tax records were missing, court documents say.