Three brothers charged with making more than 45 million robocalls

KNOXVILLE, Tenn. (WVLT) - Three New Jersey brothers will pay over $1.6 million for making more than 45 million illegal robocalls, the Federal Trade Commission announced Friday. More than 30 million of the calls were made to Americans on the FTC’s Do Not Call Registry.

According to the report, Joseph and Sean Carney, two officers from Environmental Safety International, Inc. (ESI), and their brother Raymond initiated the illegal marketing calls between January 2018 and March 2019 promoting septic tank cleaning products.

Callers falsely told consumers that the call was to provide free information about the product, but was actually a sales pitch, the report said. ESI also sent letters to the consumers that agreed to buy the product claiming they would be referred to a “national collection agency” or to an attorney for unpaid invoices, an FTC complaint said.

“The defendants continued to call consumers despite the consumers having told the defendants to stop calling and to place the consumers’ telephone number on the defendants’ internal do not call list,” the report said.

In total, the brothers must pay the United States Treasury over $1.6 million dollars, turn over a residential property and dissolve ESI within 30 days, the report said. They have also been banned from any future telemarketing endeavors.

They have also been ordered to notify all ESI customers that their balances have been cancelled.