Last week, the United States Court of Appeals for the Third Circuit rejected the appeal filed by union lawyers in Pichler v. UNITE (read the opinion here), which should result in union liability to pay a multi-million dollar damage award to employees.

The facts of the case are simple: UNITE operatives launched an organizing campaign against the Cintas Corporation, among others. As part of the campaign, UNITE operatives surveiled employee parking lots and recorded license plate numbers of parked cars (as well as cars entering and leaving). "Information brokers" then searched Department of Motor Vehicle records to obtain names and addresses corresponding to the cars.

Union organizers went to employees’ homes to pressure employees to sign union authorization cards intended to corral them into union ranks. By obtaining and using personal information from DMV records, UNITE operatives violated the federal Driver’s Privacy Protection Act (text here).

This appellate ruling clears the path for the payment of $2,500 plus possible punitive damages for each violation. If the lower court allows class-wide relief to the nearly 2,000 affected employees, friends, and families who had their DMV records illegally accessed, we’re talking tens of millions of dollars.

But court records indicate that another 12,000 or so individuals’ personal information was obtained in violation of the DPPA — and these people are entirely unaware of this invasion of their privacy. That’s why Foundation attorneys have asked the courts for the right to do a one-time mailing to these thousands of other victims. That case is currently before the Third Circuit as well (for more information, read our appellate and reply briefs).

If your personal information was obtained illegally, wouldn’t you want to know about it?