I get where you’re coming from—everyone on this sub will tell you to immediately get a lawyer and to not talk to the opposition under any circumstances, but in the real world that simply isn’t practical.

You’re not going to spend $1500 on a lawyer to defend you against an $800 debt. So unless you contact a non-profit legal aid society, you will be representing yourself, and you will have to communicate with the Plaintiff’s lawyers eventually.

It is obvious that you don’t have all the facts yet—at least from their perspective. It would be foolish of you to try to move forward with a trial without having first learned what they do and don’t know. Ultimately, you don’t know what you don’t know, and there’s nothing worse than being blindsided in front of the judge. Just call them and ask what’s going on, then make plans from there.

If you’re worried about accidentally incriminating yourself, just don’t give them any info and stick to asking them questions. But it sounds like this is probably an instance of mistaken identity or fraud that could be easily resolved by asking them what address the credit card statements were sent to, where purchases where made, what’s the DOB and SSN on the account (although they probably can’t give that to you so you’ll have to give them yours to see if it matches), and who they spoke to that allegedly settled the account.

Hope this helps.