Via: ForeclosureHamlet

The evidence on the docket as well as the Notice of Mediation prove definitively that Deutsche Bank, the Law Offices of David J. Stern, Mr- Stern himself as lead attorney of the Law Offices of David J. Stern, and/or Florida Mediation Group, Inc. Intentionally and knowingly violated a court order, a crime defined by FL Crim. Stat. Sec. 3.840, Indirect Criminal- Contempt of Judge Roger Colton’s 4/1/2010 Order for Mediation to occur within 60 days at the plaintiff’s expense.

Scribd

Via: Discovery Tactics aka Anthony Martinez & Assoc.

Latest Electronically Stored Information (ESI) Cases

I’ve been harping on the importance of demanding and acessing ESI from foreclosing parties for quite some time now.  A properly made ESI discovery request will provide numerous “smoking gun” documents that are sure to place the opposing party in a uncomfortable position.  Below I’ve identifed some of the most recent and more important cases that involve ESI.

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SAN JOSE, Calif., Aug. 20 /PRNewswire/ — A group of homeowners today filed a class-action lawsuit against Aurora Loan Services LLC, claiming the mortgage company duped them into paying tens of thousands of dollars each to have troubled mortgages reviewed by the company with promises of loan modifications, only to have their property foreclosed with little or no notice.

The suit states that Aurora reaped more than $100 million in what the court documents call “illicit profits” from the alleged scheme.

Filed in the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of California in San Jose, the suit seeks to represent homeowners who paid the Littleton, Colo.-based company money in exchange for the company’s help in ‘curing’ delinquent home mortgages.

In exchange for between three and six large monthly payments, Aurora said it would halt the foreclosure process and work with homeowners to restructure, modify or resell the loan, allowing homeowners a chance to keep their homes, the suit states.

“We intend to prove that Aurora’s workout plan was nothing more than a cynical ploy to take advantage of homeowners desperate to hold on to their homes,” said Steve Berman, managing partner of Seattle-based Hagens Berman Sobol Shapiro LLP and the attorney representing the proposed class.

The suit contends that, after a period of months, Aurora foreclosed on the homes without giving the borrowers any notice that their requests for loan modification were denied and without allowing borrowers access to any method for ending their loan deficiency, despite the provisions of the workout agreements.

The suit states that the workout agreements provided for four methods for ending loan deficiency: bringing the loan current, refinancing with another lender, modification of the terms of the loan at the discretion of Aurora and another workout option at the company’s discretion.

“The past three years have been tough enough on homeowners without them having to worry about being preyed upon by unscrupulous loan services,” Berman said.

The complaint outlines the stories of two married couples who engaged Aurora in an attempt to forestall foreclosure. The first couple, from San Jose, refinanced their home with a mortgage company in early 2006. Two years later, the couple suffered economic setbacks in the form of poorly performing investments and a temporary loss of work. In late 2009, the couple contacted Aurora and signed one of the so-called workout agreements.

Over the next several months, the couple paid a total of $33,500 in return for Aurora’s promise to work on modifying the terms of the loan, among other possible outcomes. In May 2010, the family was served with a Notice to Vacate, indicating their home had been sold in foreclosure. The family had received no prior notice that the foreclosure process had been completed. In addition, Aurora did not notify the family that it had been denied a loan modification, according to the complaint.

In another instance, a second San Jose couple refinanced their home in mid-2007. Two years later, the couple suffered financial hardship as a result of an illness and the death of a parent, which led to increased expenses and loss of income. In early 2009, the couple contacted Aurora and signed one of the company’s workout agreements, the complaint alleges.

Over the next several months, the family paid a total of $23,700 in return for Aurora’s promise to work on modifying the terms of their loan. Like the first couple, the family was served with a Notice to Vacate in late June 2010, signaling their home had been sold in foreclosure. The family was not told prior to receiving the notice that the foreclosure process on their home had begun, according to the complaint.

“We’ve heard of cases like this a lot over the last few years,” Berman said. “We’d like to bring struggling homeowners some sense of relief.”

The complaint, which can be found at www.hbsslaw.com/cases-and-investigations/aurora, accuses Aurora of negligent misrepresentation, unjust enrichment, breach of the implied covenant of good faith and fair dealing, violation of the California Unfair Business Practices Act and other violations of California law.

Hagens Berman believes the workout agreements were fraudulent in nature and seeks to have the agreements declared void. The firm also seeks an injunction against Aurora forbidding the company from continued offering of its deceptive workout agreements, restitution to be determined at trial, damages to be determined at trial and trial and attorneys’ fees.

If you entered into a so-called workout agreement with Aurora, you are encouraged to join this case.

About Hagens Berman

Seattle-based Hagens Berman Sobol Shapiro LLP is a consumer-rights class-action law firm with offices in San Francisco, Chicago, Boston, Los Angeles, Phoenix and Washington, D.C. Founded in 1993, HBSS continues to successfully fight for consumer rights in large, complex litigation. More about the law firm and its successes can be found at www.hbsslaw.com.

Contact: Mark Firmani, Firmani + Associates Inc., 206.443.9357 or mark@firmani.com

SOURCE Hagens Berman Sobol Shapiro LLP

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http://www.hbsslaw.com

Ellen Brown, August 18th, 2010
WEBofDEBT

Over 62 million mortgages are now held in the name of MERS, an electronic recording system devised by and for the convenience of the mortgage industry. A California bankruptcy court, following landmark cases in other jurisdictions, recently held that this electronic shortcut makes it impossible for banks to establish their ownership of property titles—and therefore to foreclose on mortgaged properties. The logical result could be 62 million homes that are foreclosure-proof.

Mortgages bundled into securities were a favorite investment of speculators at the height of the financial bubble leading up to the crash of 2008. The securities changed hands frequently, and the companies profiting from mortgage payments were often not the same parties that negotiated the loans. At the heart of this disconnect was the Mortgage Electronic Registration System, or MERS, a company that serves as the mortgagee of record for lenders, allowing properties to change hands without the necessity of recording each transfer.

MERS was convenient for the mortgage industry, but courts are now questioning the impact of all of this financial juggling when it comes to mortgage ownership. To foreclose on real property, the plaintiff must be able to establish the chain of title entitling it to relief. But MERS has acknowledged, and recent cases have held, that MERS is a mere “nominee”—an entity appointed by the true owner simply for the purpose of holding property in order to facilitate transactions. Recent court opinions stress that this defect is not just a procedural but is a substantive failure, one that is fatal to the plaintiff’s legal ability to foreclose.

That means hordes of victims of predatory lending could end up owning their homes free and clear—while the financial industry could end up skewered on its own sword.

California Precedent

The latest of these court decisions came down in California on May 20, 2010, in a bankruptcy case called In re Walker, Case no. 10-21656-E–11. The court held that MERS could not foreclose because it was a mere nominee; and that as a result, plaintiff Citibank could not collect on its claim. The judge opined:

Since no evidence of MERS’ ownership of the underlying note has been offered, and other courts have concluded that MERS does not own the underlying notes, this court is convinced that MERS had no interest it could transfer to Citibank. Since MERS did not own the underlying note, it could not transfer the beneficial interest of the Deed of Trust to another. Any attempt to transfer the beneficial interest of a trust deed without ownership of the underlying note is void under California law.

In support, the judge cited In Re Vargas (California Bankruptcy Court); Landmark v. Kesler (Kansas Supreme Court); LaSalle Bank v. Lamy (a New York case); and In Re Foreclosure Cases (the “Boyko” decision from Ohio Federal Court). (For more on these earlier cases, see here, here and here.) The court concluded:

Since the claimant, Citibank, has not established that it is the owner of the promissory note secured by the trust deed, Citibank is unable to assert a claim for payment in this case.

The broad impact the case could have on California foreclosures is suggested by attorney Jeff Barnes, who writes:

This opinion . . . serves as a legal basis to challenge any foreclosure in California based on a MERS assignment; to seek to void any MERS assignment of the Deed of Trust or the note to a third party for purposes of foreclosure; and should be sufficient for a borrower to not only obtain a TRO [temporary restraining order] against a Trustee’s Sale, but also a Preliminary Injunction barring any sale pending any litigation filed by the borrower challenging a foreclosure based on a MERS assignment.

While not binding on courts in other jurisdictions, the ruling could serve as persuasive precedent there as well, because the court cited non-bankruptcy cases related to the lack of authority of MERS, and because the opinion is consistent with prior rulings in Idaho and Nevada Bankruptcy courts on the same issue.

What Could This Mean for Homeowners?

Earlier cases focused on the inability of MERS to produce a promissory note or assignment establishing that it was entitled to relief, but most courts have considered this a mere procedural defect and continue to look the other way on MERS’ technical lack of standing to sue. The more recent cases, however, are looking at something more serious. If MERS is not the title holder of properties held in its name, the chain of title has been broken, and no one may have standing to sue. In MERS v. Nebraska Department of Banking and Finance, MERS insisted that it had no actionable interest in title, and the court agreed.

An August 2010 article in Mother Jones titled “Fannie and Freddie’s Foreclosure Barons” exposes a widespread practice of “foreclosure mills” in backdating assignments after foreclosures have been filed. Not only is this perjury, a prosecutable offense, but if MERS was never the title holder, there is nothing to assign. The defaulting homeowners could wind up with free and clear title.

In Jacksonville, Florida, legal aid attorney April Charney has been using the missing-note argument ever since she first identified that weakness in the lenders’ case in 2004. Five years later, she says, some of the homeowners she’s helped are still in their homes. According to a Huffington Post article titled “‘Produce the Note’ Movement Helps Stall Foreclosures”:

Because of the missing ownership documentation, Charney is now starting to file quiet title actions, hoping to get her homeowner clients full title to their homes (a quiet title action ‘quiets’ all other claims). Charney says she’s helped thousands of homeowners delay or prevent foreclosure, and trained thousands of lawyers across the country on how to protect homeowners and battle in court.

Criminal Charges?

Other suits go beyond merely challenging title to alleging criminal activity. On July 26, 2010, a class action was filed in Florida seeking relief against MERS and an associated legal firm for racketeering and mail fraud. It alleges that the defendants used “the artifice of MERS to sabotage the judicial process to the detriment of borrowers;” that “to perpetuate the scheme, MERS was and is used in a way so that the average consumer, or even legal professional, can never determine who or what was or is ultimately receiving the benefits of any mortgage payments;” that the scheme depended on “the MERS artifice and the ability to generate any necessary ‘assignment’ which flowed from it;” and that “by engaging in a pattern of racketeering activity, specifically ‘mail or wire fraud,’ the Defendants . . . participated in a criminal enterprise affecting interstate commerce.”

Ellen Brown wrote this article for YES! Magazine, a national, nonprofit media organization that fuses powerful ideas with practical actions. Ellen developed her research skills as an attorney practicing civil litigation in Los Angeles. In Web of Debt, her latest of eleven books, she shows how the Federal Reserve and “the money trust” have usurped the power to create money from the people themselves, and how we the people can get it back. Her websites are webofdebt.com, ellenbrown.com, and public-banking.com.

With no legal training, Zeenat Ali, 23, has been doing battle in court, winning judgments against the bank and two other companies mainly on procedural grounds.

excerpts:

Chain-of-title is not just an issue for the buyers and sellers of particular homes and title insurance companies. Some entity – and most likely several entities – are claiming these mortgages and loans
as assets when regulators and investors are determining solvency and compliance, but disavowing these same “assets” when acknowledgement of ownership would result in responsibilities ranging from payment of taxes to lawn mowing.

Stern employees often sign as if a bankrupt or out-of-business company or a failed bank owned the mortgage and loan up until foreclosure is imminent. In county recorders’ offices across the state, the Stern-created records show that the trusts acquired mortgages and loans on dates when no such acquisitions ever took place. The trusts claim ownership solely to prove that they have the right to foreclose. The date selected is arbitrary – chosen by Stern or LPS or the mortgage servicing company. In reality, residential mortgage-backed trusts did not rush to acquire billions of dollars in sub-prime non-performing loans in 2008 and 2009 as these assignments falsely state.

Scribd

KABOOM!!! This will send out shock waves.

After last week’s lawsuit filed on behalf of investors for possible securities fraud violations against DJSP Enterprises and another pending. I present to you another Class Action filed 7/26/2010 this time against the Law Offices of David J. Stern P.A., David J. Stern and MERSCORP, Inc..

Mr. Trent totally “gets it” and in this complaint he outlines and points out what we all have a hard time piecing together.

Here are excerpts of the complaint:

Beginning in or about 1999, the Defendant Firm joined with Defendant Merscorp, Inc., and other conspirators in the fraudulent scheme and RICO enterprise herein complained of. The employees of the Defendant Firm, including many licensed attorneys, have become skilled in using the artifice of MERS to sabotage the judicial process to the detriment of borrowers, and, over the past several years, have routinely relied upon MERS to do just that.

As Stern boasted to a room of investors at a recent promotional event, recent “direct source initiatives” by the larger lenders increasingly enable the Defendant Firm, DJSP, and other entities recently formed by Stern to take mortgages “from cradle to the grave.”

The whole purpose of MERS is to allow “servicers” to pretend as if they are someone else: the “owners” of the mortgage, or the real parties in interest. In fact they are not. The standard MERS/Stern complaint contains a lie about this very subject. While the title of the standard complaint makes reference to “lost loan documents,” in the body of the standard complaint, the Defendant Firm alleges that the plaintiff is the “owner and holder” of the note and mortgage. Both cannot be true unless the words used are given new meanings.

With the oversight of Defendant Merscorp and its unknown principals, the MERS artifice and enterprise evolved into an “ultra-fictitious” entity, which can also be understood as a “meta-corporation.” To perpetuate the scheme, MERS was and is used in a way so that to the average consumer, or even legal professional, can never determine who or what was or is ultimately receiving the benefits of any mortgage payments. The conspirators set about to confuse everyone as to who owned what. They created a truly effective smokescreen which has left the public and most of the judiciary operating “in the dark” through the present time.

The preparation, filing, and prosecution of the complaints to “Foreclose Mortgage and to Enforce Lost Loan Documents” were each predicate acts in the pattern of racketeering activity herein complained of, and were actions taken in furtherance of the MERS enterprise. The actions could not have been brought by the Defendant Firm without the MERS artifice and the ability to generate any necessary “assignment” which flowed from it.

By engaging in a pattern of racketeering activity, specifically “mail or wire fraud,” the Defendants subject to this Count participated in a criminal enterprise affecting interstate commerce. In addition to the altered postmarks described below, the mail fraud is the sending of the fraudulent assignments and pleadings to the clerks of court, judges, attorneys, and defendants in foreclosure cases. These Defendants intentionally participated in a scheme to defraud others, including the Plaintiff and the other Class Members, and utilized the U.S. Mail to do so.

These documents were executed by an “Assistant Secretary” or “Vice President,” apparently of MERS. In reality, the person executing the assignments had no knowledge whatsoever of the truth of their contents, and was simply an employee of the Defendant Firm.

Altering common hardware and/or software used by the Defendant Firm so that envelopes used to mail important legal documents, such as final judgments, to defendants contain no date of mailing in the postmark and intentionally delaying in sending the mail until defendants have lost their rights. (Exhibit F). These predicate acts constitute “mail fraud.”

Here is an explanation from David J. Stern of the continuing foreclosure rout:

One of my favorite questions from one of my believers, one of my investors on the first call-in, “What inning are we in? If this was a baseball game, what inning are we in?” And my response is, we’re only in the 2nd inning. We still have 3 innings of foreclosures left, and after the foreclosures, we have 3 innings of REO liquidation and as the REO liquidations pan out, we get into the re-fi and we get into the origination.
[ . . . ]
So yeah, we’re in the 2nd inning, but guess what – when we get to the 9th inning, it’s going to be a doubleheader and we got a second game coming. So when people say, “Oh my God, the economy is bad!” I’m like, “Oh my God, it’s great.” I mean, I hate to hear people are losing their homes and credit isn’t available and credit is such that they can’t re-fi, but if you are in our niche, it’s what we do and it’s what we want to see.

Scribd

Thank you attorney Kenneth Eric Trent P.A. from Ft. Lauderdale , FL !

Hundreds of mortgage fraud lawsuits planned

Published: Saturday, July 24, 2010

By Jameson Cook, Macomb Daily Staff Writer

Macomb, Oakland cases in federal court but may return to state

Officials at an organization representing homeowners battling their mortgage lenders say hundreds more people in the tri-county area will join additional lawsuits.

Officials at Michigan Loan Compliance Advisory Group Inc. in Troy said they plan to file lawsuits including up to another 1,000 plaintiffs against financial institutions for deceptive lending, excessive fees and other wrongdoing in granting subprime mortgages.

That’s on top of the 88 plaintiffs representing 78 mortgages in Macomb and Oakland counties who through Michigan Loan Compliance sued more than two dozen banks for awarding inflated mortgages to borrowers.

“We’re not stopping,” said May Brikho, senior consultant at Michigan Loan Compliance.

“We’re trying to convince judges there is fraud, there is a scam. The banks are not the victims. They never lost anything.

“We are getting a lot of new plaintiffs who are out of a job and they do not qualify for loan modification. People are telling other people and they are contacting us.”

The pending cases in Macomb, Oakland and a third in Wayne County were filed in state circuit court, but have since been moved to U.S. District Court in Detroit.

However, Loan Compliance attorney Ziyad Kased has asked federal Judge Arthur Tarnow to return the Oakland case to Judge Colleen O’Brien in the Oakland court in Pontiac and said he believes federal Judge Nancy Edmunds on her own may return the Macomb case back to circuit Judge John Foster in Mount Clemens.

Kased said the Oakland case should remain in state court because all of the defendants and plaintiffs do not have different state residences, which is a requirement to get the case moved.

He said that Ocwen and Saxon must gain “concurrence” of the other defendants to warrant permanent transfer and that all of the defendants must be located outside the state.

Attorney Chantelle Neumann, representing Ocwen Loan Servicing LLC, named in the Macomb case, and Saxon Mortgage Co., named in the Oakland case, gained “removal” to federal court for the time being. Neumann said the defendants did not have to gain concurrence from other defendants because the plaintiffs improperly got together.

“Plaintiffs have aggregated their grievances into one mass action in an effort to evade federal jurisdiction,” said Neumann, a Rochester Hills-based lawyer also representing Saxon, in a legal brief.

Kased says the plaintiffs have similar claims.

“There were all victims of the same predatory lending practices listed in the complaint (inflated income, understated debt, manufactured debt to income ratios etc.),” Kased says in a court document.

He contends that the case should remain since three of the defendants are “domestic Michigan corporations.”

He also said that all but three mortgages in the Oakland case are affiliated with co-defendant Mortgage Electronic Registration Systems Inc., so there is a “common thread” among them.

Continue reading….MacombDaily

SAN DIEGO, Jul 23, 2010 (BUSINESS WIRE) — Robbins Umeda LLP today announced that a class action has been commenced in the United States District Court for the Southern District of Florida (the “Court”) on behalf of purchasers of DJSP Enterprises, Inc. (“DJSP” or the “Company”) (DJSP 4.99, -0.09, -1.77%) common stock during the period between March 16, 2010 and May 27, 2010 (the “Class Period”).

DJSP is one of the largest providers of processing services for the mortgage and real estate industries in Florida and nationwide. The Company engages in providing non-legal services supporting real estate foreclosure, other related legal actions, and lender owned real estate services. The Company was founded in 1994 and is based in Plantation, Florida.

The complaint alleges that DJSP’s directors and officers issued materially false and misleading statements and failed to disclose adverse facts known to them regarding the Company’s business and financial results. As a result of these fiduciaries’ misstatements and omissions, DJSP’s stock traded at artificially inflated levels. The complaint charges DJSP and certain of its officers and directors with violations of the Securities Exchange Act of 1934.

Specifically, the complaint alleges that on March 16, 2010, DJSP filed a 6-K with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission in which it touted its quarterly results announced on March 11, 2010, and assured investors that regardless of the Obama Administration’s efforts to slow down real estate foreclosures, DSJP would continue to profit from continued defaults. Furthermore, investors were told that defaults would continue into subsequent years and that DJSP’s business would not be affected by government involvement in the mortgage market. Then in April 2010, one of DJSP’s largest clients began a foreclosure system conversion which substantially decreased the volume of foreclosures referred to the Company. Until that time, DJSP generated a significant amount of its revenue from the providing of ancillary services to referral clients.

According to the complaint, on May 27, 2010, the Company shocked the market by lowering its guidance for adjusted net income by $15 million to $17 million and for adjusted EBIDTA by $18 million to $22 million. DJSP attributed the lowered guidance to, (i) the foreclosure system conversion of one of its largest bank clients in April 2010, which resulted in a reduction in the referral of foreclosures filed; and (ii) a temporary slowdown in foreclosures due to governmental intervention programs. DJSP’s Executive Vice President and CEO explained that the reason this information was not conveyed to shareholders back in April 2010, was due to a belief that these issues would fix themselves.

If you wish to serve as lead plaintiff, you must move the Court no later than 60 days from July 20, 2010. If you wish to discuss this action or have any questions concerning this notice or your rights or interests, please contact Gregory E. Del Gaizo, Esq. of Robbins Umeda LLP, at 800-350-6003 or by e-mail at inquiry@robbinsumeda.com.

Any member of the putative class may move the Court to serve as lead plaintiff through counsel of their choice, or may choose to do nothing and remain an absent class member.

Robbins Umeda LLP is a California-based law firm, which has significant experience representing investors in securities fraud class actions, merger-related shareholder class actions, and shareholder derivative actions. For more information about the firm, please go to http://www.robbinsumeda.com.

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SOURCE: Robbins Umeda LLP

Robbins Umeda LLP
Gregory E. Del Gaizo, Esq., 800-350-6003
inquiry@robbinsumeda.com

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VIA: LawyersandSettlements.com

DJSP Enterprises, Inc. has been accused of securities fraud. If you are a current or former employee or are a member of any of DJSP Enterprises, Inc. investment plans or profit sharing retirement plans you may be included in this possible DJSP Enterprises, Inc. 401(k) or Employee Retirement Income Security Act (ERISA) class action. If you purchased or held DJSP Enterprises, Inc. stock in one of those plans during the periods Mar-16-10 to May-27-10, you may have a claim.

Under ERISA, DJSP Enterprises, Inc. employees can file a lawsuit against the company for putting stock options at risk. DJSP Enterprises, Inc. employees have a claim if they can prove their employer violated its fiduciary duty to its employees. Fiduciary duty refers to a company’s responsibility to the people who invest in it. If an employer puts the company’s interest ahead of the investors’, it has broken its fiduciary duty. A fiduciary is a person that exercises discretion over the management of plan assets or exercises discretionary control over the administration of the plan.

ERISA is a federal law that sets minimum standards for pension and health plans set up by private businesses. ERISA was designed to protect people who participate in employee benefit plans, including employees with stock options in a company. Stock options are a form of compensation in which employees are given the opportunity to purchase shares of the company stock at a certain price.

DJSP Enterprises, Inc. 401(k) / ERISA Legal Help

If you have suffered from DJSP Enterprises, Inc. 401(k) plan losses, you may qualify for damages or remedies that may be awarded in a possible DJSP Enterprises, Inc. ERISA class action lawsuit. Please click the link below to submit your complaint and we will have a lawyer review your ERISA complaint. If you are NOT a current or former employee of this company, please use this form to register your complaint. Thank you.

Last updated on Jul-21-10

CINCINNATI, Jul 21, 2010 (GlobeNewswire via COMTEX) — Notice is hereby given that a class action lawsuit was filed by the Cincinnati law firms of Strauss & Troy and Statman Harris & Eyrich on behalf of all persons who purchased the common stock of DJSP Enterprises, Inc. (“DJSP” or the “Company”) /quotes/comstock/15*!djsp/quotes/nls/djsp (DJSP5.12, -0.21, -3.94%) between March 16, 2010 and May 27, 2010, inclusive (the “Class Period”), and who suffered damages as a result. The action is pending in the United States District Court for the Southern District of Florida.

The Complaint alleges that during the Class Period, DJSP and certain of its officers and/or directors (the “Defendants”) violated the Securities Exchange Act of 1934 by issuing materially false and misleading statements and failing to disclose adverse facts known to them regarding the Company’s business and financial results. As a result the stock traded at artificially inflated prices during the Class Period.

On March 16, 2010, DJSP informed the investing community that “…there is no stopping this inflow of continued defaults that we anticipate to go for another two or three years….foreclosure volumes through 2012 are expected to increase dramatically.” Then on May 27, 2010, DJSP shocked the market when it lowered its guidance for adjusted net income by $15 to $17 million and for adjusted EBIDTA by $18 to $22 million. On this news, the Company’s shares fell nearly 29%, opening on May 28, 2010 at $6.33 per share.

DJSP indicated that the lowered guidance was a result of (i) the foreclosure system conversion of one of its largest bank clients which resulted in a reduction in the referral of foreclosure files; and (ii) a temporary slowdown in foreclosures due to governmental intervention programs.

Plaintiffs seek to recover damages on behalf of all individuals and entities who purchased DJSP common stock during the Class Period. If you purchased common stock between March 16, 2010 and May 27, 2010, you may, no later than October 20, 2010, request that the Court appoint you as lead plaintiff. A lead plaintiff is a representative party that acts on behalf of the class members. In order to be appointed lead plaintiff, the Court must determine that you meet certain legal requirements.

If you wish to review a copy of the Complaint, discuss this action, or have any questions, please contact Richard S. Wayne, Esq., or Thomas P. Glass, Esq., Strauss & Troy, 150 East Fourth Street, Cincinnati, Ohio 45202, 800-669-9341 or by e-mail at rswayne@strausstroy.com or tpglass@strausstroy.com; or Melinda Nenning, Esq., Statman, Harris & Eyrich, 3700 Carew Tower, 441 Vine Street, Cincinnati, Ohio 45202, (513) 345-8181 Ext. 3095, or by e-mail at mnenning@statmanharris.com.

The law firms of Strauss & Troy and Statman Harris & Eyrich are Cincinnati, Ohio law firms that have successfully represented shareholders in national securities class actions. For more information, visit Strauss & Troy’s website at http://www.strausstroy.com or Statman Harris & Eyrich’s website at http://www.statmanharris.com.

This news release was distributed by GlobeNewswire, www.globenewswire.com

SOURCE: Strauss & Troy; Statman, Harris & Eyrich

CONTACT:  Strauss & Troy
Richard S. Wayne, Esq.
rswayne@strausstroy.com
Thomas P. Glass, Esq.
tpglass@strausstroy.com
800-669-9341
Statman, Harris & Eyrich
Melinda Nenning, Esq.
(513) 345-8181 Ext. 3095
mnenning@statmanharris.com

(C) Copyright 2010 GlobeNewswire, Inc. All rights reserved.

Facebook’s Zuckerberg ‘quite sure’ he didn’t sign away the company

Scribd

Other defendants in the case, aside from Countrywide, several of its former top executives, and Bank of America, include 16 underwriters of more than $350 billion in Countrywide securities, among them J.P. Morgan, Deutsche Bank, Bear Stearns, UBS, Morgan Stanley, Edward Jones, Citigroup, Goldman Sachs and Credit Suisse.

July 15, 2010, 8:00 a.m.

False and Misleading Offering Documents Detailed in Class Action Lawsuit Against Countrywide Financial

Cohen Milstein Files Amended Consolidated Complaint in Case Involving $350 Billion of Mortgage-Backed Securities

WASHINGTON, July 15, 2010 /PRNewswire via COMTEX/ — Cohen Milstein Sellers & Toll PLLC filed an Amended Consolidated Class Action Complaint this week in its landmark litigation against Countrywide Financial Corporation and other underwriter defendants who were prominently involved in the failure of mortgage-backed securities over the last several years.

Countrywide, since acquired by Bank of America, was one of the largest and most controversial institutions involved in mortgage-backed securities. Other defendants in the case, aside from Countrywide, several of its former top executives, and Bank of America, include 16 underwriters of more than $350 billion in Countrywide securities, among them J.P. Morgan, Deutsche Bank, Bear Stearns, UBS, Morgan Stanley, Edward Jones, Citigroup, Goldman Sachs and Credit Suisse.

Cohen Milstein is Lead Counsel for the Class and Counsel for the Lead Plaintiff, the Iowa Public Employees’ Retirement System, as well as the Oregon Public Employees’ Retirement System and Orange County Employees’ Retirement System. The General Board of Pension and Health Benefits of the United Methodist Church is also named as a plaintiff in the litigation.

“Amidst all this high finance, it’s too easy to lose sight of the fact that pension funds invested heavily in these mortgage-backed securities and so retirees are the real victims here,” commented Steve Toll, Managing Partner at Cohen Milstein and co-chair of its Securities Fraud/Investor Protection practice group.

In the amended complaint, the Plaintiffs further buttress their allegation that the defendants published false and misleading offering documents, including registration statements, prospectuses, and prospectus supplements. Specifically, these documents misrepresented or failed to disclose that underwriting guidelines for the mortgages backing the securities had been systematically disregarded.

According to the lawsuit, from 2005 through 2007 Countrywide was the nation’s largest residential mortgage lender, originating in excess of $850 billion in home loans throughout the United States in 2005 and 2006 alone. Countrywide’s ability to originate residential mortgages on such a massive scale was facilitated, in large part, by its ability to rapidly package or securitize those loans and then, through the activities of the underwriter defendants, sell them to investors as purportedly investment grade mortgage-backed securities.

In order to generate a steady flow of mortgage loans to sustain this mass production of mortgage-backed securities, Countrywide routinely issued loans to borrowers who otherwise would never have qualified for them – and indeed, did not qualify for the loans they received — through, for example, “low doc” and “no doc” loan programs, often with adjustable interest rates that had been designed for borrowers with higher incomes and better credit.

Upon pooling these mortgages and issuing them as MBS certificates, over 92% received the very highest, investment-grade ratings from rating agencies; ultimately, however, 87% were downgraded to junk. Tellingly, one year after the date of the certificate offerings, delinquency and default rates on the underlying mortgages had increased 2,525% from issuance. In explaining such an unprecedented collapse in ratings on these certificates in 2008 and 2009, the rating agencies noted that they were forced to change their models because of previously undisclosed and systematic “aggressive underwriting” practices used to originate the mortgage loan collateral. Along with the exponential increases in delinquency and default rates of the underlying mortgages and the collapse of the certificates’ ratings, the value of the certificates plummeted.

Plaintiffs’ complaint alleges that the Defendants’ actions violated Sections 11, 12(a)(2), and 15 of the Securities Act of 1933, legislation, still on the books, originally enacted in response to similar abuses that led to the Great Depression.

The Countrywide case is pending before Judge Mariana R. Pfaelzer in the U.S. District Court for the Central District of California.

Cohen Milstein has been named lead or co-lead counsel by courts in eight of the most significant mortgage-backed securities cases currently being litigated, including Lehman Brothers, Bear Stearns and Washington Mutual as well as Countrywide.

Docket No. 2:10-CV-00302

SOURCE Cohen Milstein Sellers & Toll PLLC

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