## Facts

- Kathleen Francis Jones (formerly Fritch) was ordered in a California divorce decree to pay $468 per month in child support for her son, who was in the father’s primary physical custody.
- After Jones missed approximately three payments, the child’s father retained U.S. Child Support Recovery and its principal, Zandra L. Perkins, to collect alleged arrearages.
- Defendants wrote Jones asserting she was $1,285 in arrears and demanded payment; Jones admitted delinquency and sought a payment arrangement, which Defendants refused.
- Jones alleged Defendants used coercive collection methods, including leaving harassing phone messages that attacked her parenting and called her a “bad mother.”
- Jones also alleged Defendants created and distributed a “Dead Beat Parent”/“Wanted” style poster about her to members of her family and to her employer to pressure payment.
- After the court previously dismissed Jones’s FDCPA and IIED claims, only a Utah invasion-of-privacy claim remained, pleaded under theories of (a) publicity given to private life and (b) intrusion upon seclusion.

## Issues

1. Whether sending the “Dead Beat Parent” poster to Jones’s family and employer satisfied the “publicity” element required for the tort of publicity given to private life.
2. Whether Defendants’ alleged phone harassment and related tactics could constitute an intentional intrusion upon Jones’s seclusion that would be highly offensive to a reasonable person.
3. Whether Utah law requires proof of special (pecuniary) damages to maintain an intrusion-upon-seclusion claim, or whether emotional distress damages may suffice.

## Decision

- The court granted summary judgment for Defendants on the publicity-given-to-private-life theory because dissemination to Jones’s family and employer was not “publicity” to the public at large or to so many persons as to make the matter public knowledge.
- The court denied summary judgment on the intrusion-upon-seclusion theory because a reasonable jury could find the alleged harassing calls and humiliating tactics highly offensive.
- The court held Jones was not required to allege or prove special damages to proceed on intrusion upon seclusion; emotional distress damages could support the claim.
- Defendants’ summary-judgment motion was granted in part and denied in part, leaving the intrusion claim for trial.

## Legal Principles

- For publicity given to private life, “publicity” requires broad dissemination to the public at large or to a sufficiently large group that the matter is substantially certain to become public knowledge; limited disclosure to a small group is insufficient.
- Intrusion upon seclusion requires an intentional intrusion into another’s solitude or private affairs that would be highly offensive to a reasonable person; persistent, coercive collection harassment can satisfy this standard.
- Invasion-of-privacy damages may include mental and emotional distress without proof of physical injury or pecuniary loss; special damages are not a prerequisite to an intrusion-upon-seclusion claim under Utah law.

## Conclusion

The court rejected a privacy claim based on limited distribution of humiliating collection materials because it did not meet the “publicity” requirement, but permitted an intrusion-upon-seclusion claim to proceed where the alleged debt-collection conduct could be found highly offensive, and it confirmed that emotional distress damages alone may support such an intrusion claim.


Jones v. U.S. Child Support Recovery, 961 F. Supp. 1518 (D. Utah 1997)