SUPREME COURT – STATE OF NEW YORK
I.A.S. PART XIII SUFFOLK COUNTY
HON. MELVYN TANENBAUM
Justice
US BANK N.A.,
-against-
ORLANDO BORJA ET AL.,
ORDEREDthat this motion by plaintiff seeking an order granting summary judgment, amending the caption of the action and appointing a referee to compute the sums due and owing to plaintiff in this mortgage foreclosure action is granted.
The Court has repeatedly directed plaintiffs counsel, Steven J. Baum, P.c., to submit proposed orders of reference in proper form and counsel’s office has repeatedly failed to comply.
Accordingly, plaintiff’s counsel is hereby directed to submit a proposed order for the appointment of a referee in the forn required by this Court. Any further failure to comply with this order shall be deemed wilful.
Supreme Court of the State of New York, held
in and for the County of Kings, at the
courthouse at 360 Adams Street
David Schmidt
Justice of the Supreme Court
MORTGAGE ELECTRONIC REGISTRATION SYSTEMS INC.,
v.
Bibi Roopen
To cancel the claim for the surplus monies on the above Index Number 1694 1/04 by the Claimant Merrill Lynch Mortgage Lending, Inc. Attorney Steven J. Baum. P.C. and to grant me, Bibi Roopan, the surplus monies on deposit in this matter. for the reasons that Neither Wilshire Credit Corporation, who owned the second mortgage to the premise commonly known as 14 Cypress Court Brooklyn, NY 11208, nor its parent company, Merrill Lynch Mortgage Lending. were present at the foreclosure and therefore did not claim their share of the foreclosure at that time (Notice of Appearance). En addition. Wilshire Credit Corporation transferred the mortgage loan to Strategic Recovery Group, LLC, db Aquara Loan Services, Its Successors and/or Assigns, P.O. Box 61026 Anaheim, CA 92803-6126 on October 29.2008 and on July 6,2010, Strategic Recovery Group sent me a letter to settle in full for $30,497.10.
Pending the hearing of this motion it is ordered that to cancel & stop the claim for the surplus monies on the above index Number 16941/04 by Claimant Merrill Lynch Mortgage Lending, Inc, Attorney Steven J. Baum, PC and for the surplus monies to stay at the courts until judgement by the judge and also that Merrill Lynch Mortgage Lending
PLAINTIFF’S ATTORNEY:
STEVEN J. BAUM, P.C.
P.O. Box 1291
Buffalo, New York 14240- 1291
Wells Fargo v. Oleg Dmitriev
Plaintiffs application is defective because there is no “affidavit made by the party” of “the facts constituting the claim, the default and the amount due” as required by CPLR §3215(f). The proffered “affidavit of merit and amount due” of Jeffrey Stephan identifies him as “the Limited Signing Officer of GMAC MORTGAGE LLC, servicer,” but no proof of Mr. Stephan’s authority to execute such affidavit on behalf of plaintiff is offered. The proffered affidavit does not otherwise comply with the requirements of CPLR $2309(c) for an out-of-state affidavit. In addition, the facts and dates recited in the affidavit regarding the consolidated mortgage and consolidated note that are the subject of this floreclosure action are at variance with the underlying documents.
In light of the foregoing, the motion for an order of reference is denied, without prejudice to renewal on proper papers.
Proposed order of reference marked “not signed.”
Dated: March 16, 2009
I go through hundreds of cases each week and I have been saving this one for a rainy day. We’ll it’s raining today.
SUPREME COURT – STATE OF NEW YORK I.A.S. PART XXXVI SUFFOLK COUNTY PRESENT: HON. PAUL J. BAISLEY, JR., J.S.C.
DATED: MAY 10. 2010
The Court is at a loss to understand how a purported “correcting assignment” can be executed eight days before the assignment it is purporting to correct. Moreover, the Court is at a loss as to the identity of the true holder of the mortgage at the time of the commencement of the action (irrespective of any arguments regarding the validity of the purported assignment(s) by MERS as nominee of the original mortgagee; see, for example, US Bank, N.A. II Collymore, 200 NY Slip Op 09019 [2d Dept 2009]), While it is well established that any issues as to a plaintiff’s standing to commence a foreclosure action are waived by the defendant-mortgagor’s failure to appear and answer (HSBC Bank v Dammond, 59 A03d 679 l2d Sept 2009]), the contradictory and conflicting submissions on this motion implicate far more than the more issue of “standing.” Indeed, the submissions appear to have been drafted with utter disregard for the facts, or for counsel’s responsibilities as an officer of the Court, and border on the fraudulent.
In the the circumstances, the motion, which is unsupported either factually or legally, is denied in all respects. Moreover, in light of the failure of the movant to establish that any party was in fact the holder of the mortgage (and the underlying note, see KLuge v Fugm:y, 145 AD2d [2d Sept 1988J) at the time of the commencement of this action – an omission that in the circumstances may not be corrected by mere amendment — the Court, on its own motion, hereby directs the plaintiff to show cause why the complaint should not be dismissed; and further directs Steven J. Baum, P.c. and Heather A. Johnson, Esq., the attorney of record for the plaintiff in this action and the scrivener of the affirmation referred to above, to appear before the undersigned on June 24, 2010 at II :00 a.m. to show cause why sanctions should not be imposed on plaintiff and/or its attorney(s) for frivolous conduct pursuant to 22 NYCRR §130-1.1 (c).
The court held that it “will hold a hearing to determine what sanctions if any, that may be imposed upon Steven J. Baum, P.C. for the false representations made in the petition,” as counsel for Federal Home Loan Mortgage Corp.
Last Updated: 12:01 PM, February 28, 2010 Posted: 12:54 AM, February 28, 2010
As the mortgage melt down paralyzed the economy across the US and throughout New York State, one company in the center of the storm had all the business it could handle.The little-known law firm of Steven J. Baum PC, which is based in suburban Buffalo, NY, and represents dozens of banks in matters of failed mortgages, last year filed a staggering 12,551 foreclosure lawsuits in New York City and the suburbs, which works out to about 48 a day.
The foreclosure mill is one of a handful of super-regional law firms used by the country’s banks — and its lawyers appear to have practiced in every county courthouse and bankruptcy court from Staten Island to Plattsburgh and from Montauk to Niagara Falls.
But as the volume of its workload increased, so did complaints from opposing lawyers and judges that some of the thousands of lawsuits contained questionable legal work.
One bank caught in the crosshairs is JPMorgan Chase Bank, one of the largest mortgage lenders in the city.
Last month, Diana Adams, the US Trustee in Manhattan, filed papers in court supporting punitive financial sanctions against the bank for a string of bad behavior, including seeking to foreclose on homes after they rejected the attempts to make on-time payments and for failing to prove they own the mortgage on a home even as they move to seize it.
Chase filed documents that appear to be patently false or misleading, Adams said in the filing.
Although Chase has recently taken steps to address concerns expressed by courts in connection with other cases, based on Chase’s past and current conduct it needs to be sanctioned, Adams wrote.
A spokesperson for Chase had no comment on the US Trustee’s action.
The complaints against Baum — on the record during hearings, in legal pleadings and, eventually, borne out in judges’ decisions — include:
* Not divulging mortgage payments: In the White Plains bankruptcy of Blanca Garcia, Baum’s firm filed papers claiming Garcia was in arrears — when she actually made payments and showed the court her receipts, but they were not credited to her account. When Garcia’s lawyer complained, Baum’s firm answered the claim but, the lawyer said in court papers, ignored the receipts and continued to claim the mortgage was in arrears.
* Creating questionable assignments: A Suffolk County judge took it upon himself to investigate a filing by Baum’s firm when it attempted to foreclose on the home of Gloria E. Marsh. “A careful review,” the judge wrote in a four-page order, “reveals a number of glaring discrepancies and unexplained issues of substance.”
By RICHARD WILNER Last Updated: 1:36 AM, July 6, 2010 Posted: 1:31 AM, July 6, 2010
A Bronx homeowner is scheduled for a courtroom battle royale later this month — facing off in Manhattan bankruptcy court against the largest foreclosure mill in the state to see if the firm’s client, GMAC Mortgage, has the right to toss her from her Pelham Gardens home.
Also at issue is whether the law firm, Steven J. Baum PC, may have a conflict of interest problem.
The lawyer for the homeowner, David Shaev, claims in recently filed court papers that a Baum lawyer allegedly represented GMAC without disclosing she worked for Baum.
The thorny issue is of growing interest to New York judges — who last year faced more than 50,350 foreclosure actions, according to RealtyTrac, many of which were brought by banks that have sold or securitized the loans. Such actions make proving which entity owns the loan difficult.
DAVID SHAEV Fighting foreclosure.
That issue is key — banks that can’t prove they own a loan can’t legally foreclose. At times, lenders and law firms have been chastised for taking short cuts to gloss over the ownership issue.
Complicating matters is that most delinquent homeowners battle foreclosure actions without a lawyer and get steamrolled.
But that may be changing.
On June 3, Bankruptcy Judge Allan Gropper denied a bank’s attempt to move against a homeowner because it couldn’t prove it owned a mortgage.
Five days later, Brooklyn state court Judge Wayne P. Saitta, citing a bank’s “egregious” misrepresentation, awarded a homeowner $10,000 in sanctions when the bank tried to evict knowing it didn’t own the mortgage.
Post staff for NYPOST Last Updated: 4:42 AM, July 5, 2010 Posted: 12:44 AM, July 5, 2010
Brooklyn’s battling Judge Arthur M. Schack has struck again, giving a Brooklyn homeowner an Independence Day gift — freedom from foreclosure.
The judge, who has steadfastly pressed banks in foreclosure cases to prove they own the troubled mortgage and has tossed cases when banks have failed to do so, has again dismissed a foreclosure case — this time because the lawyer on the case, Steven J. Baum, represented the mortgage broker, the bank that bought the loan and the industry registration service serving as the nominee of the loan.
But Baum’s conflict of interest wasn’t the case’s only problem.
Judge Schack, in his decision, also found that the bank, US Bank, never should have filed the foreclosure action because of an “ineffective assignment of the subject mortgage and note to it.” In other words, it sold the mortgage, and the mortgage was securitized, leaving the company simply as the servicer — but it decided to try and take back the Crown Heights home anyway.
The Post has reported that the actions of the Baum firm in foreclosure cases has caught the eye of the US Trustee, the arm of the Justice Department responsible for monitoring the Bankruptcy Court.
Baum, a Buffalo-based foreclosure mill that filed 12,551 foreclosure actions in New York last year, has been scolded by judges for bringing foreclosure cases without proper documentation.
In this case, a Baum lawyer, Elpiniki Bechakas, signed papers claiming to be an executive of Mortgage Electronic Registration System, or MERS, which was given certain rights to the mortgages by the broker, Fremont Investment and Loan, while simultaneously representing Fremont and US Bank, which filed the foreclosure in July 2009.
“The Court is concerned that the concurrent representation by [the Baum firm] of both assignor MERS, as nominee for Fremont, and assignee plaintiff US Bank is a conflict of interest,” Schack wrote.
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