LexisNexis Lawsuit Alleges Data Broker Retaliated Against Thousands Covered by Daniel’s Law in NJ

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A proposed class action lawsuit alleges LexisNexis Risk Data Management has illegally intimidated and retaliated against thousands of public servants and their family members who, under a New Jersey privacy law, requested that the commercial data broker no longer disclose their home addresses and unpublished home phone numbers. 

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The 31-page LexisNexis lawsuit claims that the data broker, rather than comply with Daniel’s Law requests from active and retired law enforcement officers, prosecutors and judges, has instead frozen their credit reports, permanently tarnishing their credit histories with alleged “identity thefts” that never happened.  

“LexisNexis’s response to these Daniel’s Law requests should never have been a close call, and never should have triggered any credit freezes,” the filing states, accusing LexisNexis of engaging in “a prolonged effort to thwart Plaintiffs’ efforts to lift these credit freezes.” 

Daniel’s Law was passed after Daniel Anderl, the 20-year-old son of New Jersey Federal Judge Ester Salas, was shot and killed by a gunman posing as a delivery man at the front door of the family home, the lawsuit explains. The subsequent investigation found that the perpetrator had “certain political and personal grievances against the judge” and went to her home that day to kill her, but instead killed her son and critically wounded her husband, the suit states.  

Investigators linked the attack with the shooting of an attorney in California who was similarly killed answering the door at his home to pick up a purported package from the same gunman, who authorities determined was “disgruntled over certain legal cases with similar political and legal issues” to what was pending before Judge Salas, the case reads. 

The gunman was able to find the home addresses of both murder victims through various people-finding resources available online, the same kind of data-broker platform operated by LexisNexis Risk Data Management, the lawsuit stresses. 

According to the case, LexisNexis has implemented unrequested, unlawful and harmful security freezes that New Jersey public servants did not request and went a step further by improperly reporting that each individual suffered from identity theft, “a complete fabrication.” 

“LexisNexis openly acknowledged in their letters of retribution that this reporting of identity theftand credit freeze may result in Plaintiffs being denied crucial financial, insurance, and health services,” the suit mentions. 

Importantly, Daniel’s Law requests and credit-freeze requests are separate, and a credit freeze does not implicate compliance with the privacy law, the filing highlights. The pseudonymous plaintiffs say that although they sent requests to LexisNexis under Daniel’s Law in December 2023 and January 2024, the data broker responded by freezing their credit while continuing to make publicly available information with their names and home addresses, as well as detailed reports on family members. 

The lawsuit looks to cover all persons who submitted a written Daniel’s Law request to cease the disclosure of their home address or unpublished home telephone number and upon whom LexisNexis Risk Data Management thereafter imposed a credit freeze. 

The case also looks to represent those who submitted a written Daniel’s Law request to stop the disclosure of their home address or unpublished home phone number and upon whom LexisNexis thereafter reported the request to a third party as a request pursuant to the New Jersey Identity Theft Prevention Act. 

The filing relays that the proposed class consists of at least 18,000 people. 

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