Georgia Prosecutes First Violators of Payday Loan Ban

Written by Nickel - 3 Comments

The Georgia Supreme Court has upheld the conviction of two lenders charged with violating the state’s ban on payday loans. The two lenders, who were convicted of more than 40 violations, argued that the law violates the federal equal protection clause by unfairly targeting businesses located in Georgia. According to prosecutors, the two men subtly changed their business practices after the law was enacted. One puported to run a check-cashing service, and began referring the lending fee a “CheckGuard.” The other attempted to disguise the loans by including an option to buy a parcel of real estate that he owned — not surprisingly, no customers ever exercised that option. Both mean were given 15 years of probation, making them first Georgians to be successfully prosecuted under the law.

According to District Attorney Joe Mulholland:

“I’m not going to go out and celebrate, because I’m sure I’ll be doing this again next week. It’s kind of like the war on drugs, it’s never going away.”

[Source: Access North Georgia]

Published on May 16th, 2007 - 3 Comments
Filed under: Debt Reduction
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About the author: Nickel is the founder and editor-in-chief of this site. He's a thirty-something family man who has been writing about personal finance since 2005, and guess what? He's on Twitter!

Comments (scroll down to add your own):

It’s good to see that Georgia is taking the lead to protect consumers against loan sharks (which is basically what payday loan companies are).

The next step in protecting consumers is education.

Hmmm, maybe run a “payday loan customer turned financially intelligent” contest of some kind…
Comment by Crediteria.com — May 18th 2007 @ 3:21 pm
Woo hoo! Chalk one up for the good guys
Comment by Ben — May 18th 2007 @ 11:04 pm
I don’t see how this can be a good thing. This sets the precedent that the government can tell you how and how not to manage your finances. What’s next? A limit on the number of credit cards we can have? Business permits denied on the grounds that the business plan sounds too risky? How is it that government intrusion is welcomed in the South? We the people need to back the goverment out of our lives, not welcome it further into them.
Comment by Daniel — May 19th 2007 @ 1:32 am