Michelle Lore at Minnesota Lawyer picked up on my post about Minnesota DFL’ers out to eviscerate consumer protection laws. She included quotes from several Minnesota attorneys, who point out that in addition to being a dumb idea, the bill attacks the idea of a “private attorney general.”
These statutes further the “private attorney general principle,” according to Cummins. “The attorney general … can’t bring all the cases that need to be brought to ensure that the law is completely and comprehensively respected. So the private bar needs to be involved in helping with law enforcement.”
An example, according to consumer law attorney Samuel Glover, is a tenant who is unlawfully locked out of his or her home. While the landlord is liable for $500 under Minn. Stat. sec. 504B.231, many tenants can’t afford to pay a lawyer to recover the money, and lawyers can’t afford to work on a contingency fee in such a case.
The Legislature, wanting to ensure that tenants could actually sue their landlords for locking them out, decided to make the landlord pay the tenant’s lawyer, Glover explained.
“This makes a small damages award into a meaningful consumer protection law,” he wrote on caveatemptorblog.com shortly after the bills were introduced. “The tenant can bring the case with a lawyer’s help, and the landlord has a strong incentive to pay up for clear violations.”
Attorney fees under fire | Minnesota Lawyer
If you are in Minnesota, contact The Glover Law Firm, LLC, for a free case evaluation. In any other state, you can find a consumer rights lawyer using the National Association of Consumer Advocates lawyer database.
