The Oregonian | By Aimee Green | October 9, 2018
A Southeast Portland woman who says debt collectors keep showing up at her door looking for “Steven” — someone she swears she doesn’t know — has filed a $400,000 lawsuit to make them stop.
Caitlin Kelly is suing Aaron’s, a Southeast Portland appliance, furniture and electronics store with ties to the national chain, saying a demand letter and slips of paper left at her home indicate the store is trying to collect on a debt owed by Steven.
The lawsuit says representatives from the store have shown up at her home nearly a dozen times so far this year. Kelly says she has twice called management at the store at 16140 S.E. Division St. to plead with them to stop.
“Basically, they don’t believe that he still doesn’t live here,” Kelly said. “They just keep coming and coming and coming.”
Aaron’s, the national chain, has more than 1,700 stores nationwide. About a third of them, including the Southeast Division Street store, are independently operated franchises. Kelly is suing only the local franchise, NW Freedom Corp. A representative for the franchise declined to comment.
According to Kelly’s lawsuit, men looking for Steven have repeatedly banged on her door — sometimes in the early morning, waking her two children, ages 10 months and 3 years.
“They’ve pounded 15 to 20 minutes,” Kelly told The Oregonian/OregonLive. “Like crazy pounding. Like they’re police.”
She said she’s invited the men into her home and garage to prove that Steven doesn’t live there and so they can see that merchandise Steven allegedly bought on credit from the store isn’t there either.
She’s also offered the men her landlord’s phone number to aid their effort to track Steven down, she said. When they wouldn’t stop coming and threatened to get a search warrant to once again enter her home, she said, she called police asking for help.
Kelly said police told her to call them if the men show up again.
Kelly also sought the help of Portland attorney Michael Fuller, who filed the lawsuit last week in Multnomah County Circuit Court. It seeks $400,000 in damages for “invasion of privacy” and “intentional infliction of emotional harm.” The suit also reserves the right to seek up to $3.6 million in punitive damages.
“It has just been horrible getting harassed,” Kelly said. “We’re thinking about moving because of it.”
Read the lawsuit here.
