California Civil Code 1788.10 – No debt collector shall collect or attempt to collect a consumer debt …
No debt collector shall collect or attempt to collect a consumer debt by means of the following conduct:
(a) The use, or threat of use, of physical force or violence or any criminal means to cause harm to the person, or the reputation, or the property of any person;
Terms Used In California Civil Code 1788.10
- Arrest: Taking physical custody of a person by lawful authority.
- Attachment: A procedure by which a person's property is seized to pay judgments levied by the court.
- Garnishment: Generally, garnishment is a court proceeding in which a creditor asks a court to order a third party who owes money to the debtor or otherwise holds assets belonging to the debtor to turn over to the creditor any of the debtor
- Obligation: An order placed, contract awarded, service received, or similar transaction during a given period that will require payments during the same or a future period.
- property: includes property real and personal. See California Civil Code 14
- will: includes codicil. See California Civil Code 14
(b) The threat that the failure to pay a consumer debt will result in an accusation that the debtor has committed a crime where such accusation, if made, would be false;
(c) The communication of, or threat to communicate to any person the fact that a debtor has engaged in conduct, other than the failure to pay a consumer debt, which the debt collector knows or has reason to believe will defame the debtor;
(d) The threat to the debtor to sell or assign to another person the obligation of the debtor to pay a consumer debt, with an accompanying false representation that the result of such sale or assignment would be that the debtor would lose any defense to the consumer debt;
(e) The threat to any person that nonpayment of the consumer debt may result in the arrest of the debtor or the seizure, garnishment, attachment or sale of any property or the garnishment or attachment of wages of the debtor, unless such action is in fact contemplated by the debt collector and permitted by the law; or
(f) The threat to take any action against the debtor which is prohibited by this title.
(Added by Stats. 1977, Ch. 907.)