FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
December 14, 2008
Financial Blast Faxer is Sued by Indiana Attorney General Steve Carter
Envarion Corp. blanketed the State with Junk Investment and Charitable Advertisements
(INDIANAPOLIS, IN) – On December 12th, Indiana Attorney General Steve Carter filed a lawsuit in Hamilton County against Envarion Corporation, a Texas-based business, and its president, George P. Godfrey, III, seeking an injunction to halt Godfrey and the company from blast faxing unwanted advertisements to Indiana residents.
“These fax offers are frustrating for business owners who bear the brunt of the costs of unsolicited junk faxes,” said Attorney General Carter. “We don’t want Indiana citizens wasting their time sorting through unwanted piles of paper each day. Home-based businesses also have the added frustration of interrupted privacy during the owners’ time spent with family.”
Envarion allegedly sent unwanted faxes offering various financial advertisements including fundraisers, stocks and investment opportunities to consumers in 57 counties throughout Indiana. Some of the faxes were sent in the form of a newsletter under various names such as Hot Stocks on the Street, Momentum Trader or Asian Investment Alert. In the largest number of violations recorded since the Do Not Fax law’s 2007 inception, the attorney general’s office received 1,842 complaints regarding the unsolicited faxes and made several attempts to resolve the matter before filing suit.
The state law makes the transmittal of unsolicited fax advertisements a deceptive act and allows the attorney general’s office to recover civil penalties of up to $1,500 per violation.
In addition, the law requires the following for the transmission of facsimile advertisements:
- The recipient must have requested the fax, or an existing business relationship must exist between the recipient of the fax and the business responsible for sending fax;
- A cost-free number for recipients to use to transmit a request to no longer receive the advertisements; and
- Faxes must contain an area at the top or bottom of each page that contains the date and time sent, an identification of the business or individual sending the message, and the telephone number of the machine from which the fax originated.
The cases have been filed in the Hamilton Circuit Court.
To date the attorney general’s office has filed 18 lawsuits against violators of the Do Not Fax law and has obtained voluntary compliance from another 368 companies since enforcement of the law began January 1, 2007.
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