Supreme Court Denies Driving Record Class Action Lawsuit Appeal

Supreme Court Denies Driving Record Class Action Lawsuit Appeal

By John Curran

The Driver’s Privacy Protection Act of 1994 was designed to protect citizen’s information from illegal or dangerous collection. However, by refusing to hear an appeal from a plaintiff with a motor vehicle record class action lawsuit, the Supreme Court has allowed the Eighth Circuit Court of Appeals to carve out a new exemption in the statute.

According to the law, companies and individuals are only allowed to access the driving record of another person for the following relevant reasons:

1) To verify the accuracy of personal information or to correct it,
2) For producing statistical reports and research or distribution of surveys to people that have opted into a company program,
3) For use by employers and private investigation agencies, or
4) When written consent is provided.

However, Marcy Johnson alleged in a proposed class action lawsuit that West Publishing Corporation’s mass purchase of records of millions of drivers did not satisfy any of those exemptions, or any of the rest of the 14 total stipulated in the Driver’s Privacy Protection Act. In a petition for a writ of certiorari to the Supreme Court, her class action lawsuit lawyer alleges that the Eighth Circuit Court of Appeals failed to account for a definition of “authorized recipient” described by the defense team that does not exist.

Instead, the appeals court decided that the practice of buying driving record information en masse was legal, in spite of a lower court judge’s opinion that a reseller must be held to the same standards as any other requester an “be able to articulate a specific permissible use from among the closed universe of permissible uses under section 2721(b).”

The writ also cited the Supreme Court’s own decision in Maracich v. Spears that held that none of the exemptions “are written to authorize private individuals to acquire the most restricted personal information in bulk merely to propose a commercial transaction for their own benefit,” and added that West Publishing did not articulate any additional plan in obtaining the records.

Finally, the writ argued that the Eighth Circuit court’s interpretation created a new statute provision by ignoring the lack of language regarding an “authorized recipient” and that they were wrong to decide based on an assumption that a company like West would act lawfully.

As a result of the appeals court decision and the Supreme Court refusing to hear the case, the new acceptable method of obtaining driving records will apply not just to jurisdictions governed by the Eighth Circuit, but the Fifth and Seventh Circuit Courts of Appeals as well.

The Motor Vehicle Record Class Action Lawsuit is Marcy Johnson v. West Publishing Corporation, Case No. 12-cv-1172. It was originally filed in U.S. District Court, Western District of Missouri as Case No. 10-cv-04027.

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