## Facts

- South Carolina car buyers alleged that attorneys obtained their names and addresses from state DMV records and used the data for a mass direct-mail campaign.
- The attorneys were pursuing group lawsuits against car dealerships over allegedly unlawful administrative fees and sought additional affected buyers.
- The attorneys requested thousands of purchaser records from the DMV and mailed letters urging recipients to contact the firms and join the lawsuits.
- The letters were solicitations for legal representation and included contingent-fee agreements.
- The recipients sued under the Driver’s Privacy Protection Act of 1994 (DPPA), which restricts disclosure and use of personal information from motor vehicle records subject to enumerated exceptions.
- The attorneys argued their conduct fit the DPPA exception allowing use of DMV information “in connection with” litigation, including investigations in anticipation of litigation.

## Issues

1. Whether obtaining and using DPPA-protected DMV information to identify and solicit prospective clients by mass mailing is a use “in connection with” litigation within the DPPA’s litigation exception.
2. Whether filing or contemplating a group/class action permits counsel to use DMV information to locate plaintiffs through direct-mail advertising under the litigation exception.

## Decision

- The Supreme Court vacated the Fourth Circuit’s judgment and remanded.
- The Court held that mass solicitation of clients is not a permissible purpose under the DPPA’s litigation exception.
- The Court concluded that when the principal purpose for using DMV data is to solicit clients, the use falls outside the litigation exception, even if related to pending or contemplated litigation.
- The Court indicated that such use is unlawful unless another DPPA exception applies (e.g., a consent-based solicitation provision), which was not satisfied on the record.

## Legal Principles

- DPPA exceptions are construed in light of the statute’s privacy-protective purpose and should not be read so broadly that they effectively nullify the general prohibition on disclosure and use.
- The litigation exception covers uses integral to litigation functions (e.g., investigating facts, locating witnesses, conducting discovery), but not uses whose principal purpose is commercial client recruitment.
- Statutory structure matters: the presence of a distinct solicitation-related exception, conditioned on express consent, weighs against interpreting the litigation exception to authorize client-solicitation uses that would render the consent requirement superfluous.
- A “principal purpose” inquiry can distinguish litigation-related uses with incidental solicitation effects from solicitation-driven uses that are not sufficiently connected to litigation tasks.

## Conclusion

The Court held that attorneys may not rely on the DPPA’s litigation exception to justify obtaining and using DMV personal information primarily to solicit clients through mass mailings, and it sent the case back for further proceedings under that narrowed interpretation.


Maracich v. Spears, 570 U.S. 48 (2013)