Daily Report-

A Marietta lawyer sued by the U.S. Consumer Financial Protection Bureau for running what the agency calls a “lawsuit mill” for debt collectors wants a judge to dismiss the case as an unconstitutional ploy to federally regulate lawyers.

In a motion filed Friday to dismiss the suit, attorneys defending Frederick Hanna, his Marietta firm and three firm lawyers called the litigation “an unprecedented overreach” of federal authority which could have “a profound chilling effect” on access to the court system.

Hanna’s lawyers say the federal agency’s drive to permanently bar Hanna from filing collection actions against debtors violates a “centuries-old principle of deference to states in regulating the practice of law, as well as Congress’s express intent not to regulate how lawyers litigate cases in state courts.” Defense attorneys also say the consumer bureau’s efforts to punish Hanna and his staff “for acts performed within the scope of their representation of clients … is an overt obstruction of the fundamental right to petition courts for resolution of legal disputes under the First Amendment.”

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