Critics see law firm’s debt collection maneuver as an abuse of the court system
Regulators haven’t heard of it, but a judge denounced it as questionable, if not ‘unconscionable.’
(Rick Egan | Tribune file photo) In this March 20, 2020, file photo, Sen. Kirk Cullimore speaks at a Capitol news conference about the state response to the outbreak of the coronavirus. The law firm in which Cullimore is a partner is Utah s leader in evictions and debt collections. In some cases it has employed an usual maneuver to seize someone s legal claim, auction it off, purchase it and dismiss it. A federal judge criticized the move as questionable at best, unconscionable at worst.
Landlords evict hundreds of Utah renters each month despite a ban during the pandemic
Landlords use loopholes, lack of enforcement to ignore eviction bans. Legal help for renters is scarce.
(Trent Nelson | The Salt Lake Tribune) Kayleigh Allred at her grandparents home in West Jordan on Wednesday, Dec. 9, 2020. She and her family were evicted from their town-home in October by the Law Offices of Kirk Cullimore. She said they were locked out and given no opportunity to retrieve belongings.
By Eric S. Peterson, Cathy McKitrick, Taylor Hartman, Ria Agarwal and McKhelyn Jones
| Dec. 12, 2020, 4:03 p.m. | Updated: Dec. 13, 2020, 5:43 p.m.
The following story was supported by a grant from the Economic Hardship Reporting Project and was written and researched by The Utah Investigative Journalism Project in partnership with The Salt Lake Tribune.