05/26/2025
Coerced debt, says Teal Inzunza, associate vice president of justice initiatives at the Urban Resource Institute in New York, is one of the most pernicious kinds of financial abuse.
This happens in any gender combination.
Five years ago, Sarah Ortiz began the process of leaving her abusive husband.
Since then, she has been trying to prove to the judges in her divorce proceedings that she was left in the dark by her husband and unknowingly saddled with debilitating debt.
“Right now, he’s in debt around $100,000,” Ortiz told Katie Hercheroeder, and he wants her to pay half of it—on top of the $45,926 (and 99 cents) of debt in her name. “Most of [it],” she continued, “I didn’t know existed.” It’s a hard battle. “It’s his word versus mine,” she said, “and my name is on the document.”
Sarah’s experience has been repeated by scores of women across the country who are victims of coerced debt, or “nonconsensual credit-related transactions,”—and it's ridiculously hard to crack down on.
As Hercheroeder reports, “According to surveys of survivors of intimate partner violence, up to 99 percent of victims of domestic violence experience some kind of financial injury related to the abusive relationship; this ranges from lost wages from missed work to costs associated with housing instability and the more extreme cases, like Ortiz’s, of mass debts accrued by a controlling partner.”
The coercion happens in private. Lines of credit are opened on a computer in a shared home. The debt balloons, but the payments aren’t made.
Then the victim gets a call from debt collectors, telling them they are responsible for thousands of dollars in unpaid charges, often plus high interest.
Coerced debt, as Teal Inzunza, associate vice president of justice initiatives at the Urban Resource Institute in New York, told Herchenroeder, is one of the most pernicious kinds of financial abuse.
Over several interviews, Ortiz detailed being haunted by debt previously unbeknownst to her, brought on throughout a marriage she has been trying to leave—claims confirmed by her lawyer and a family member, in addition to court documents, police records, emails, and messages sent through the co-parenting application OurFamilyWizard that were reviewed by Mother Jones.
You can read Ortiz’s story at the link below: https://tinyurl.com/3zuhbmvy
📸: Sophie Park
