HOUSTON, Jan. 5, 2012 /PRNewswire/ — Gibbs & Bruns LLP announced today that its clients have issued instructions to US Bank and HSBC, as Trustees, to open investigations of ineligible mortgages in pools securing over $19 billion of Residential Mortgage Backed Securities (RMBS) issued by various affiliates of Wells Fargo.  Collectively, Gibbs & Bruns’ clients hold over 25% of the Voting Rights in 48 Trusts that issued these RMBS. 

“Our clients continue to seek a comprehensive solution to the problems of ineligible mortgages in RMBS pools and deficient servicing of those loans.  Today’s action is another step toward achieving that goal,” said Kathy D. Patrick of Gibbs & Bruns LLP, lead counsel for the Holders.     

The Holders anticipate that they may provide additional instructions to Trustees, as needed, to further the investigations.  The securities that are the subject of these instruction letters include: 

ABOUT GIBBS & BRUNS LLP
Gibbs & Bruns is a leading boutique law firm engaging in high-stakes business and commercial litigation.  The firm is renowned for its representation of both plaintiffs and defendants in complex matters, including significant securities and institutional investor litigation, director and officer liability, contract disputes, fraud and fiduciary claims, energy, oil and gas litigation, construction litigation, insurance litigation, trust & estate litigation, antitrust litigation, legal and professional malpractice, and partnership disputes. Gibbs & Bruns is routinely recognized as a top commercial litigation firm in the US.  For more information, visit www.gibbsbruns.com.

National Mortgage News-

JPMorgan Chase & Co.’s chief executive, Jamie Dimon, told investors at the beginning of 2011 that potential repurchases of private-label mortgage securities are “not that material” for his bank — an assertion that increasingly appears to be in doubt.

Dimon might not be quite so confident these days. Gibbs & Bruns LLP, the law firm that negotiated an $8.5 billion mortgage repurchase settlement with Bank of America Corp. on behalf of a group of large investors, has announced that it is seeking put-backs on $95 billion in private-label mortgage-backed securities issued by JPMorgan Chase, Washington Mutual Inc. and Bear Stearns. Private-label securities are mortgage-backed securities or other bonds that are created and sold by companies other than government-sponsored entities like Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac.

[NATIONAL MORTGAGE NEWS]

In case you want a refresher of Attorney Kathy Patrick you can read a letter from Attorneys for Bank of America, who fired back at her on November 4, 2010 about her “baseless allegations”.

Her $8.5 billion Bank of America settlement over bad mortgage deals was just the beginning. Now, backed by bond giants Pimco and BlackRock, Texas lawyer Kathy Patrick is gearing up for a new legal assault on the financial industry.

[FORBES]

Hmmmm…. Could we get any warmer?

 IN RE WELLS FARGO MORTGAGE-BACKED CERTIFICATES LITIGATION.

By Jody Shenn and David Mildenberg – Nov 5, 2010 4:21 PM ET

Bank of America Corp., responding to the attorney for a bondholder group that’s pushing the bank to repurchase soured home loans, demanded proof the lawyer is authorized to mount an attack on behalf of investors including units of BlackRock Inc. and MetLife Inc.

Wachtell, Lipton, Rosen & Katz’s Theodore N. Mirvis is among lawyers for Bank of America who said in a letter yesterday to Houston-based Gibbs & Bruns LLP’s Kathy Patrick that they want the names of individuals who approved signatures on a letter Patrick sent the Charlotte, North Carolina-based lender last month. They also want to know whether the board of directors for the bondholders Patrick said she represents approved signing of her correspondence.

“Troubling aspects of your letter strongly suggest that it was written for an improper purpose, or in furtherance of an ulterior agenda,” Bank of America’s attorneys wrote, saying they see no need to take action in response to Patrick’s letter.

Investors are stepping up efforts to recoup losses on mortgage bonds, which plummeted in value amid the worst slump in home prices since the 1930s. Bank of America Chief Executive Officer Brian T. Moynihan said Oct. 19 the lender will “defend our shareholders” by disputing any unjustified demands for mortgage buybacks.

Bank of America’s lawyers said they couldn’t determine “whether any investigation of your allegations is warranted” unless Patrick proves her clients own as much of the bonds created by the bank’s Countrywide Financial Corp. unit as they claim. Patrick also needs to show on a deal-by-deal basis how the bank is falling short of its responsibilities in servicing the home loans in the 115 securitizations at issue, they said.

Moynihan’s Surprise

Moynihan, 51, said yesterday that he was surprised by the Oct. 19 letter from investors, which included the Federal Reserve Bank of New York.

Moynihan’s company has resolved other debt disputes with the investors, and he has called BlackRock CEO Larry Fink to discuss the mortgage buyback issue, he said.

Patrick declined to comment.

Jerry Dubrowski, a spokesman for Bank of America, confirmed the letter’s authenticity and declined to comment further.

Lawyers Brian E. Pastuszenski of Goodwin Procter LLP and Marc T.G. Dworsky of Munger, Tolles & Olson LLP also signed the yesterday’s letter to Patrick, which was reported earlier today by the New York Times.

Do Not Print Letter Below (Poor quality and might not come out)

[ipaper docId=41405566 access_key=key-1ajd5uhf38y18hutsz68 height=600 width=600 /]

By Thom Weidlich, Laurel Brubaker Calkins and Jody Shenn – Oct 26, 2010 12:01 AM ET

Kathy D. Patrick is a Houston lawyer who spends her Sundays teaching children about God. The rest of the week, according to one attorney who knows her, she can be “as frightening as a pit bull on steroids.”

That’s bad news for issuers of mortgage-backed securities like Bank of America Corp. Patrick represents bond investors including the Federal Reserve Bank of New York and BlackRock Inc. who are seeking to force the bank to buy back bad home loans, claiming the debt failed to match contractual promises about its quality.

Her law firm, Gibbs & Bruns LLP, is a 30-lawyer outfit that says it specializes in “bet the company” litigation. This month, it reached a settlement with JPMorgan Chase & Co. and Bank of Montreal stemming from an alleged fraud at a Canadian gold company. Earlier this year, Goldman Sachs Group Inc. and UBS AG settled with the firm over the sale of $550 million in mortgage-backed securities. Patrick reached that settlement on behalf of her clients just two months after filing suit.

Patrick, 50, is “fearless and tenacious,” said Dan Cogdell, a Houston criminal-defense lawyer who said she is capable of pit bull-like aggressiveness “if the need be.” If she succeeds in getting Bank of America to settle, it may trigger more calls for buybacks in the $1.4 trillion market for so-called non-agency mortgage securities, which lack government backing.

Bank costs from repurchasing mortgages in such securities may total as much as $179.2 billion, including expenses related to suits against bond underwriters, Chris Gamaitoni, a Compass Point Research and Trading LLC analyst, estimated in August.

$1.73 Billion

In June 2009, Patrick got Credit Suisse Group AG and Deutsche Bank AG to agree to pay $1.73 billion to end litigation over their decision to back out of the leveraged buyout of Huntsman Corp. Her firm is suing Zurich-based Credit Suisse as bond underwriter for a now-defunct Ohio company that sold securities based on health-care providers’ unpaid bills.

“She has a deep understanding of the banking process and the constraints, motivations and incentives of the banking industry,” said Harry M. Reasoner, a partner at Vinson & Elkins LLP in Houston, who also represented Huntsman.

In the fight against Charlotte, North Carolina-based Bank of America, Patrick represents the biggest bond investors in the U.S., including Pacific Investment Management Co., which runs the world’s biggest bond fund.

$47 Billion

On Oct. 18, she wrote Bank of America and Bank of New York Mellon Corp., the trustee for $47 billion of bonds created by Bank of America’s Countrywide Financial unit. In the letter, she accused Countrywide of failing to service the home loans properly. Her clients want Bank of America, which bought Countrywide in 2008, to take back some of the underlying loans, and are questioning its servicing as a way to broaden their legal options, Patrick said the next day.

“We continue to review and assess the letter, and have a number of questions about its content, including whether these investors have standing to bring these claims,” Bank of America Chief Financial Officer Charles H. Noski said Oct. 19 on a conference call with analysts. “We continue to believe the servicer is in compliance with the servicing obligations.”

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One by one these will soon all come out…

Fraction of an Excerpt from BLOOMBERG:

Richard M. Bowen, former chief underwriter for Citigroup’s consumer-lending group, said he warned his superiors of concerns that some types of loans in securities didn’t conform with representations and warranties in 2006 and 2007.

“In mid-2006, I discovered that over 60 percent of these mortgages purchased and sold were defective,” Bowen testified on April 7 before the Financial Crisis Inquiry Commission created by Congress. “Defective mortgages increased during 2007 to over 80 percent of production.”

<SNIP>

“The potential for owners to challenge lenders on foreclosure improprieties certainly is there,” Pallotta said. “Even if it turns out that the banks were right in 99 percent of these foreclosures, the additional diligence on their part, going forward, is going to cost them more money.”

The litigation over buybacks, also known as putbacks, can also pit big banks against each other. Last month, Deutsche Bank AG, acting as a trustee, refiled a lawsuit over misrepresented mortgages in $34 billion of Washington Mutual Inc. mortgage securities, with $165 billion in original balances.

The new suit in the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia included JPMorgan as a defendant, after the Federal Deposit Insurance Corp. said that JPMorgan was wrongly claiming its insurance fund had agreed to cover the liabilities, according to the amended complaint.

Continue reading…BLOOMBERG

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By Jody Shenn – Oct 19, 2010 5:27 PM ET

Pacific Investment Management Co., BlackRock Inc. and the Federal Reserve Bank of New York are seeking to force Bank of America Corp. to repurchase soured mortgages packaged into $47 billion of bonds by its Countrywide Financial Corp. unit, people familiar with the matter said.

A group of bondholders wrote a letter to Bank of America and Bank of New York Mellon Corp., the debt’s trustee, citing alleged failures by Countrywide to service loans properly, their lawyer said yesterday in a statement that didn’t name the firms. The New York Fed acquired mortgage debt through its 2008 rescues of Bear Stearns Cos. and American International Group Inc.

Investors are stepping up efforts to recoup losses on mortgage bonds, which plummeted in value amid the worst slump in home prices since the 1930s. Last month, BNY Mellon declined to investigate mortgage files in response to a demand from the bondholder group, which has since expanded. Countrywide’s servicing failures, including insufficient record keeping, may open the door for investors to seek repurchases by bypassing the trustee, said Kathy Patrick, their lawyer at Gibbs & Bruns LLP.

“We now are in a position where we have to start a clock ticking,” Patrick, who is based in Houston, said today in a telephone interview.

If the issues aren’t fixed within 60 days, BNY Mellon should declare Countrywide in default on its servicing contracts, Patrick said.

Continue reading…BLOOMBERG

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