A former patient of Senator Roger Marshall, Republican of Kansas, on Thursday filed a class-action lawsuit against him and his former medical practice, contending that he charged illegally high interest rates in pursuing patients over outstanding bills.
Mr. Marshall, who had a 25-year career as an obstetrician-gynecologist, sued more than 700 patients over unpaid bills, The New York Times found in an investigation last month. In at least 81 of those cases, patients were arrested after missing court dates.
Mr. Marshall, a first-term senator, is facing an unexpectedly tight race to keep his seat, with recent polls showing him neck-and-neck with his Democratic challenger, Adam Hamilton, in a state that hasn’t elected a Republican senator since 1932.
The lawsuit, filed in Kansas state court, focuses on the 18 percent interest rate that Mr. Marshall and the medical practice he co-owned, Heartland OBGYN, often charged patients.
It argues that the high rate was “egregious conduct” that may have violated Kansas law.
Kansas typically limits the interest rate that doctors and any other businesses can pursue in court to 15 percent. There are, however, some exceptions that allow them to pursue more if they had a pre-existing contract spelling out a higher rate.
A Marshall spokeswoman did not immediately respond to a request for comment on the litigation.
Steven Johnson, a lawyer who filed Mr. Marshall’s debt cases, previously told The Times that the 18 percent interest rate was set by the doctor’s office.
“Generally, at the time of services for all our clients if they were not paid up front, the Debtor agreed to an 18 percent interest rate,” Mr. Johnson wrote in a text message. He described this as “common practice” and “pretty much the way it works in the state of Kansas.”
Mr. Marshall, however, appears to have charged more interest than other doctors. The Kansas City Star reviewed debt collection filings from about 150 providers, and found no others charging 18 percent. Most charged 12 percent instead.
The Times has not been able to review the original contracts that Mr. Marshall signed with his patients, which are now decades old.
The lead plaintiff in the class-action suit, Meischa Zimmerman, was featured in The Times article. It is unclear whether other patients have joined the lawsuit, and Ms. Zimmerman’s lawyer could not be reached immediately for comment.
Mr. Marshall’s medical practice sued her in 2009 for $3,596 in outstanding debt related to the delivery of her daughter by cesarean section. She was arrested three times for missing court dates related to the case, once while she was eight-months pregnant and at home with her 2-year-old daughter.
Ms. Zimmerman’s experience has become a focal point of the Kansas Senate rate, which polls show to be extremely close. After the Times article ran, Ms. Zimmerman participated in an ad for the Hamilton campaign in which she describes one of her arrests.
Mr. Marshall sent the Hamilton campaign a cease-and-desist letter regarding the advertisement, arguing that it was “defamatory” in how it described his debt collection practices.
The Hamilton campaign has defended the ad as accurate, and continues to run it on local television stations.
The post Former Patient Files Class-Action Lawsuit Against Senator Marshall appeared first on New York Times.
