Fighting for the Right to Help

An Arm and a Leg

Society & Culture, Medicine, Health, Health & Fitness, Documentary

4.8 • 1.1K Ratings

🗓️ 24 March 2022

⏱️ 19 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

It’s illegal to advise someone who’s being sued for medical debt, unless you're a lawyer. Yep, really. Even in its most basic form (like helping people fill out a checklist) it’s considered the “unlicensed practice of law.” And it’s a crime. As in, you could go to jail.

So some New Yorkers are suing to get that changed.

The non-profit Upsolve wants to help people represent themselves in court when they’re being sued over debt. Their plan is to train people like pastors, social workers, and librarians and others to help people others know their rights. And iIn the Bronx, Reverend John Udo-Okon is one of those volunteers, ready to help.

We meet the CEO of Upsolve and Reverend John to talk about their work – and why they’re suing the state of New York.

Here’s a transcript of the episode.

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Transcript

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0:00.0	Hey there.
0:01.0	In October 2019, a few days before Halloween, I visited the General Sessions Courthouse in Memphis
0:06.8	where lawsuits get heard, with the journalist Wendy C. Thomas.
0:11.4	Wendy had spent a lot of time in that courthouse.
0:17.2	Over the course of more than a year, she had documented that the biggest hospital in town
0:21.2	had been suing thousands of patients over unpaid bills, including lots of its own badly paid
0:26.6	employees.
0:27.6	And Wendy's incredible work got results, when she published her story, that hospital
0:32.8	had actually dropped thousands of cases and promised not to file new ones.
0:37.3	That had been a few months before, but there were other hospitals, other medical groups,
0:41.4	still at it.
0:42.4	So there were cases to see.
0:44.4	Plenty of.
0:45.4	There was no recording allowed in the courtroom, but Wendy and I debriefed on the way out.
0:52.9	Yeah, things were moving so fast, I was like, I don't think I could take notes this
0:56.4	fast.
0:57.4	We'll go out there still.
0:58.4	Yeah.
0:59.4	I was going to try to time how quickly he was moving through the cases, but you know, probably
1:04.9	less than 10 seconds, just, yeah, per case.
1:09.7	Even counting into ones for people to show it up.
1:12.8	Yeah.
	...

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