Plaintiff Charles Young sued Rob Kolkman, Constable Kolkman, LLC, and Michael Erickson under the Fair Debt Collection Practices Act and for fraud, alleging that Defendants engaged in false and threatening collection efforts. The jury trial was set to begin April 20, 2026, before District Judge Ted Stewart in the District of Utah.
The central evidentiary fight concerned whether Young could call eight third-party witnesses to show that Defendants made the same false threats to thousands of people, never completed a single property sale despite those threats — as Young contended — and ran a deliberate scheme rather than making isolated mistakes. Young argued the testimony was essential to proving fraud, intent, knowledge, and both statutory and punitive damages. Judge Stewart held that the limited probative value of a handful of selected witnesses was substantially outweighed by the dangers of unfair prejudice, jury confusion, and the time that would be consumed litigating the specific facts of each third party's separate debt-collection experience.
The court also held that the FDCPA's statutory damages provision — which directs consideration of the frequency and persistence of violations — is best read to focus on conduct directed at the specific individual plaintiff, not at third parties. The court noted that Defendants themselves were better positioned to testify about the volume and consistency of their own letter-writing and collection practices.
On the underlying debt, both sides largely agreed it was irrelevant to FDCPA liability, and the court excluded evidence of the debt's validity and amount for that purpose. The court also barred Young from using his fraud claim to collaterally attack the validity of the state court judgment on which Defendants were collecting, holding that only the existence of the judgment — not its validity — remained relevant. The court granted Young's motion to block broad inquiry into his personal financial circumstances, while leaving open the possibility of a narrowly tailored inquiry if Defendants presented one before trial.
On bifurcation, Defendants argued that evidence of their wealth — specifically, potential testimony that they collected $3.5 million from debtors over the years — would be so prejudicial that punitive damages should be tried separately. Judge Stewart denied the request, holding that the liability and punitive damages issues were not so separable as to compel bifurcation, that the jury would be instructed on punitive damages, and that bifurcation would unnecessarily consume additional time and resources.
The court denied Defendants' broader motion to exclude all evidence unrelated to Young, finding that Defendants had not identified the specific evidence they sought to exclude with enough precision for the court to conduct a proper Rule 403 balancing analysis. The court noted that Plaintiff may argue for admissibility of such evidence at trial if he can support it with arguments not addressed in the ruling.