Georgia lawyer who sued Facebook collects $50,000 award through Meta bank account
When Jason Crawford finally collected his default judgment from suing Facebook, he couldn’t wait to post it on Facebook.
“It was one of the first things I did, once I collected,” said the Columbus personal injury lawyer who sued the media giant for deleting his account.
“Facebook never offered a single penny, even though I had a $50,000 judgment against them,” he posted Tuesday, the day he got the check. “They simply went back to ignoring me.”
He won the Muscogee State Court lawsuit by default because Facebook owner Meta never responded. His lawsuit claimed damages from losing access to family photos after his account was hacked by someone who, according to Facebook, violated its standards on child sexual material.
Reports of his suit drew widespread interest from others similarly affected. Crawford has been collecting their contact information, should it be useful in a later legal claim.
“I’ve probably had 500 people reach out to me,” he said Tuesday.
The collection
Just as Meta ignored Crawford’s lawsuit, so it also ignored his judgment.
But the lawyer knew how to collect: By hiring another lawyer, who hired a private investigator, who tracked down a Meta bank account to garnish.
“Well, it turns out they bank with Bank of America,” Crawford added in his Facebook post. “We garnished their account, and just like that, I collected the entire judgment with interest.”
Speaking Tuesday by phone, he said he had no special plans for the $52,325.89, the precise amount on the check he posted a photo of. He was paid through the Muscogee Superior Court Clerk’s office, which received the funds garnished in a filing by Columbus attorney Fife Whiteside.
“It’s really one of the strangest pieces of work I’ve ever been involved in,” said Whiteside, who’s been practicing law for 47 years.
It was new to Crawford, too. He’s been a lawyer for 30 years. “Frankly, I’ve never had to go out and collect,” he said.
Whiteside said Meta disregarded not only the suit and the judgment, but also the post-judgment discovery, when it was supposed to give Crawford information on its bank accounts. “They just ignored it,” he said.
Because lawyers typically don’t represent themselves in court, Crawford hired Whiteside to handle the garnishment, and Whiteside hired an investigator to get Meta’s banking information, to file on an account.
Finding that Meta used Bank of America, which has offices in Columbus, he was able to target one of those Meta accounts, he said.
It was strange to treat an international corporation like someone who refused to pay for a car, Whiteside said: “They really feel like great big deadbeats.”
The claim
Crawford, 53, discovered his Facebook account had been deleted on Aug. 15, 2022, when a one-second pop-up window told him he had violated its prohibition on child sexual exploitation.
He was outraged not only at losing access to the family photos and videos he kept on Facebook, but at being accused of so heinous an offense.
“Facebook’s conduct was negligent and proximately caused plaintiff harm,” he wrote in his claim. “Plaintiff’s Facebook account has valuable materials, photographs, narrative content, and communication channels that plaintiff has been deprived from accessing based on a violation that did not occur.”
Meta had up to 45 days to respond to Crawford’s claim. With no word from the company, months beyond the deadline, State Court Judge Andy Prather ruled Feb. 21 that Meta had defaulted, by not responding, and awarded Crawford the $50,000.
On Tuesday, Crawford mused that if Meta ignores such claims as a matter of course, maybe all the Facebook users who have complained to him about its conduct should give this a shot.
“I’m thinking about filing a lawsuit for everybody just to see if they default on it,” he said.
Meta has not responded to requests for comment.
This story was originally published August 16, 2023 at 12:26 PM.