Abstrakt Marketing Group TCPA Lawsuit Over Voicemail Drops

A B2B lead generation company based in St. Louis, Abstrakt Marketing Group, was sued in the Abstrakt Marketing Group TCPA lawsuit filed by Edward Newman Jr. in January 2025, which alleged that the company’s use of prerecorded “voicemail drops” to cold-call cell phones violated the Telephone Consumer Protection Act. On April 27, 2026, a federal judge denied Abstrakt’s motion to dismiss and let the case move forward. The parties resolved the matter almost immediately, and Newman voluntarily dismissed the case on May 14, 2026. No settlement terms were made public.

Who Sued and What He Alleged

Edward Newman Jr. filed suit on January 30, 2025, in the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Missouri, Case No. 4:25-cv-00123.¹ He said he received an unsolicited voicemail on his cell phone from an Abstrakt employee named Joe Rotarius, who was cold-calling on the company’s behalf to solicit commercial contracting work.² The message opened with a generic “Hello” rather than his name, and Newman contended it was not left live but delivered automatically through voicemail drop software.

The TCPA prohibits using an artificial or prerecorded voice to call a cell phone without the recipient’s prior express consent. Newman argued that Abstrakt’s voicemail drop practice fell squarely within that prohibition.³ Voicemail drop technology lets a salesperson record one message and have software deliver it into a prospect’s voicemail inbox whenever a cold call goes unanswered, with no live conversation.

The FCC had already addressed the technology directly. In a November 2022 Declaratory Ruling, the agency found that ringless voicemails sent to wireless phones are “calls” made using an artificial or prerecorded voice and therefore subject to the TCPA’s consent requirements.⁴

Why the Court Refused to Dismiss

Abstrakt moved to dismiss under Rule 12(b)(6), arguing Newman had not plausibly alleged the voicemail was actually prerecorded. It also moved to strike references in the amended complaint to internal employee complaints about cold calling and to Abstrakt’s own website content promoting voicemail drop tools, calling those allegations immaterial.

On April 27, 2026, Judge Maria A. Lanahan denied both motions in full.² Her reasoning:

A message does not need to sound robotic to qualify as prerecorded. Abstrakt argued that because the voicemail sounded like a natural human voice with normal pauses and tone, it could not be “prerecorded” under the TCPA. The court rejected that, noting a real person can record a message in their own voice and then deploy it through automated software. The statute does not require the message to sound artificial.⁵
Abstrakt’s own marketing cut against it. The company’s website promoted voicemail drops as a “must-have feature” that “saves significant time” for sales representatives on cold-calling campaigns. The court found it reasonable to infer that the voicemail Newman received was a product of that technology.²³
The generic greeting mattered. The message said “Hello” rather than using Newman’s name, which the court found consistent with a mass-distributed prerecorded message rather than a live, personalized call.²
Employee complaints were relevant context. Allegations about internal employee complaints regarding cold calling practices provided, in the court’s words, “important context and background” making it more likely that Abstrakt relied on voicemail drops to streamline its sales process.²

Judge Lanahan also distinguished the case from Metzler v. Pure Energy USA LLC, an earlier decision that had dismissed a TCPA claim where a “ringless voicemail” allegation was the plaintiff’s only factual basis. Newman’s complaint added Abstrakt’s promotional materials, the generic message content, and the employee complaints, and the court found that combination sufficient.²

How It Was Resolved

The day after the ruling, on April 28, 2026, Newman filed a “Notice of Resolution and Joint Request to Stay,” indicating the parties had reached an agreement. Newman filed a Notice of Voluntary Dismissal on May 14, 2026, and the court terminated the case on June 1, 2026.¹ No settlement amount or terms were disclosed publicly. The timing, with the resolution notice arriving the day after Abstrakt lost its motion to dismiss, suggests the ruling prompted the parties to negotiate an end to the case.

What the Ruling Means for Voicemail Drop TCPA Claims

Because the case settled before any decision on the merits, the ruling that stands is the denial of the motion to dismiss. That decision set a low bar for pleading a voicemail drop TCPA claim. Plaintiffs do not need to show the message sounded robotic, that they received multiple identical messages, or that the caller failed to respond to questions. “Common-sense details” about the message’s generic nature and the defendant’s own use of the technology are enough to survive dismissal.⁵

For companies that market voicemail drop capabilities as a selling point, the case created an uncomfortable dynamic. The same website copy that attracts clients became evidence in the complaint against Abstrakt, and the court treated it as a fair basis for inferring how the company communicated with prospects. Combined with the FCC’s 2022 position that ringless voicemails are “calls” under the TCPA, the ruling gives plaintiffs’ lawyers a workable template for future cases against senders of prerecorded voicemail marketing.⁴

1
PACER Monitor. Newman Jr v Abstrakt Marketing Group, LLC
2
Justia. Newman Jr. v. Abstrakt Marketing Group, LLC, No. 4:25-cv-123 MAL
3
ACA International. Newman v. Abstrakt Marketing Group, LLC
4
Federal Communications Commission. FCC Finds Ringless Voicemails Are Subject to Robocalling Rules
5
TCPAWorld. Denied: Abstrakt Stuck in TCPA Suit Based on Voicemail Drops