N. L. v. Credit One Bank, N.A., 960 F.3d 1164

Credit One hired vendors to place collection calls to a delinquent customer (D.V.); D.V. had (the court assumed) given consent to be called at a cell number ending in -9847.
The -9847 number was reassigned (without Credit One’s knowledge) to Sandra Lemos; her 11‑year‑old son N.L. used the phone.
Over four months vendors placed 189 automated calls to the reassigned number using dialing systems that call numbers from preset lists.
N.L. sued under the TCPA and California law; he settled with the vendors and proceeded to trial against Credit One. The district court instructed the jury that consent must come from the current subscriber or the nonsubscriber customary user (not the intended recipient).
The jury awarded N.L. $500 per call (total $94,500) under the TCPA; the Ninth Circuit affirmed, holding that a caller cannot avoid TCPA liability by pointing to consent from an intended but uncalled recipient.

Issue	Plaintiff's Argument	Defendant's Argument	Held
Whether "called party" under 47 U.S.C. § 227(b)(1) can mean the caller's intended recipient rather than the actual recipient/current subscriber/customary user	"Called party" means the receiving party; liability exists if the person who actually received the call did not consent	Caller may rely on consent given by the intended recipient (the prior subscriber) even if the number was reassigned and the actual recipient did not consent	The court held "called party" refers to the actual recipient (current subscriber or nonsubscriber customary user); intent to call a different person does not defeat liability.
Whether an ATDS must be able to generate random/sequential numbers (vs. merely store and dial lists)	N.L.: the vendor systems that store/dial numbers qualify as ATDS under Ninth Circuit precedent	Credit One: ATDS should require number-generation capacity (random/sequential); no evidence vendors’ systems had that capacity	Court, bound by Marks v. Crunch, held ATDS includes equipment that stores and dials numbers; the district court’s instruction was consistent with circuit precedent.

Soppet v. Enhanced Recovery Co., 679 F.3d 637 (7th Cir. 2012) (rejects "intended recipient" reading; treats "called party" as actual recipient/subscriber)
Osorio v. State Farm Bank, F.S.B., 746 F.3d 1242 (11th Cir. 2014) (same conclusion rejecting intended‑recipient defense)
ACA Int'l v. FCC, 885 F.3d 687 (D.C. Cir. 2018) (vacated FCC safe harbor addressing reassigned numbers; analyzes "called party" concept)
Leyse v. Bank of Am. Nat’l Ass’n, 804 F.3d 316 (3d Cir. 2015) (supports reading "called party" as the receiving/subscriber party)
Marks v. Crunch San Diego, LLC, 904 F.3d 1041 (9th Cir. 2018) (holds ATDS includes devices that store numbers to be called)
Dominguez v. Yahoo, Inc., 894 F.3d 116 (3d Cir. 2018) (contrasting authority holding ATDS requires random/sequential number generation)