This is hardly the beginning. It’s just getting started.
CBS-
(AP) LAS VEGAS — A lawyer in Las Vegas has filed a civil lawsuit seeking class-action status on behalf of homeowners he says have been hurt by the filing of fraudulent foreclosure documents during an alleged “robo-siging” scheme.
Matthew Callister said he wants a state judge to stop tainted home sales and evictions and order Lender Processing Services Inc. and several bank and mortgage companies to modify loans and pay monetary damages to affected homeowners.
“This is to say, ‘Stop. Let us try to modify the loan appropriately,'” Callister said. “Then we’ll seek damages.”
Someone best remind LPS of what the Nevada Attorney General is capable of!
She has opened the doors for other great AG’s to follow her footsteps. We’re sure to see in the very near future.
LVRJ-
Nevada Attorney General Catherine Cortez Masto called allegations that her office improperly outsourced a foreclosure document robosigning investigation “groundless.”
The claim was made by Lender Processing Services Inc., the nation’s largest lender services company, after Masto filed a lawsuit on Friday claiming the company participated in a widespread fraud involving robosignings and other deceptive practices.
Nevada attorney general accuses the company of document fraud and illegal fee-splitting. Shares are likely to continue to decline.
MSN-
The shares of Lender Processing Services (LPS +1.87%) came under fire Friday, dropping nearly 20% on unusually high volume after Nevada Attorney General Catherine Cortez Masto filed fraud charges against the company.
Although LPS, a billion-dollar company by market capitalization, has several business lines, the fraud charges relate to its largest (by revenue) default services division. Given the nature of the charges and the mound of evidence AG Masto cites in the complaint, Friday’s fall in share price is likely only the beginning.
In recent years, LPS’s default servicing division has come under fire for two practices central to the attorney general’s charges: document fraud and illegal fee-splitting. Both types of claims go right to the heart of LPS’s business model.
They will not survive this time around as the complaint is pretty much bulletproof.
PRNEWS-
Unfortunately, the company’s efforts to engage in meaningful discussions with the Nevada Attorney General’s office have been frustrated by the Nevada Attorney General’s decision to outsource its investigation to Cohen Milstein Sellers & Toll PLLC, a plaintiff’s law firm located in Washington, D.C., in apparent violation of Nevada law. The complaint highlights misconceptions about LPS and seeks to sensationalize a variety of false allegations in a misleading manner.
Lax is a major understatement given the Atomic Bomb Nevada AG just dropped… on an Organization Bondi claims is investigating, with headquarters in Florida!
Orlando Sentinel-
As attorneys general in other foreclosure-battered states step up their investigations into fraudulent mortgage practices by large U.S. banks, some Florida groups are accusing state Attorney General Pam Bondi of being soft on the giant lenders.
Florida’s Democratic state senators recently released a video that targets Bondi, a Republican elected to a nonpartisan office. Titled “Ignoring the Florida Foreclosure Crisis,” the video contrasts new fraud investigations launched by California Attorney General Kamala Harris with controversial forced resignations of two key mortgage-fraud investigators in Bondi’s Fort Lauderdale office.
Document fraud infects many if not most foreclosures across the country, and Lender Processing Services (LPS) is a major reason why. As a result, many are celebrating Nevada Attorney General Catherine Cortez Masto’s civil fraud suit against the company. Her suit details, based on numerous witnesses’ testimony, documents, and other evidence, how LPS’s business model was deceptive and fraudulent.
LPS organized its workforce to churn out documents that were replete with lies, improperly directed foreclosure and bankruptcy attorneys, misrepresented its fees, and made numerous misleading statements to investors. Frankly, it’s hard to see how LPS survives this suit and the shareholder and other cases that are sure to follow.
The suit’s tremendous clarity and detail raise several questions beyond “when will LPS declare bankruptcy?”
5. Following the exposure of deceptive document execution practices at DOCX
[…]
15 Georgia, LPS then misrepresented that it had processes and internal controls in place at the LPS 16 Default Solutions office in Minnesota to ensure that affidavits were signed properly and in 17 accordance with industry standard. LPS senior executives expressly contradicted these 18 representations in sworn court testimony.
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE Contact: Jennifer López DATE: December 16, 2011 702-486-3782
NEVADA ATTORNEY GENERAL SUES LENDER PROCESSING SERVICES FOR CONSUMER FRAUD
Carson City, NV – Attorney General Catherine Cortez Masto announced today a lawsuit against Lender Processing Services, Inc., DOCX, LLC, LPS Default Solutions, Inc. and other subsidiaries of LPS (collectively known “LPS”) for engaging in deceptive practices against Nevada consumers.
The lawsuit, filed on December 15, 2011, in the 8th Judicial District of Nevada, follows an extensive investigation into LPS’ default servicing of residential mortgages in Nevada, specifically loans in foreclosure. The lawsuit includes allegations of widespread document execution fraud, deceptive statements made by LPS about efforts to correct document fraud, improper control over foreclosure attorneys and the foreclosure process, misrepresentations about LPS’ fees and services, and evidence of an overall press for speed and volume that prevented the necessary and proper focus on accuracy and integrity in the foreclosure process.
“The robo-signing crisis in Nevada has been fueled by two main problems: chaos and speed,” said Attorney General Masto. “We will protect the integrity of the foreclosure process. This lawsuit is the next, logical step in holding the key players in the foreclosure fraud crisis accountable.”
The lawsuit alleges that LPS:
1) Engaged in a pattern and practice of falsifying, forging and/or fraudulently executing foreclosure related documents, resulting in countless foreclosures that were predicated upon deficient documentation;
2) Required employees to execute and/or notarize up to 4,000 foreclosure related documents every day;
3) Fraudulently notarized documents without ensuring that the notary did so in the presence of the person signing the document;
4) Implemented a widespread scheme to forge signatures on key documents, to ensure that volume and speed quotas were met;
5) Concealed the scope and severity of the document execution fraud by misrepresenting that the problems were limited to clerical errors;
6) Improperly directed and/or controlled the work of foreclosure attorneys by imposing inappropriate and arbitrary deadlines that forced attorneys to churn through foreclosures at a rate that sacrificed accuracy for speed;
7) Improperly obstructed communication between foreclosure attorneys and their clients; and
8 ) Demanded a kickback/referral fee from foreclosure firms for each case referred to the firm by LPS and allowed this fee to be misrepresented as “attorney’s fees” on invoices passed on to Nevada consumers and/or submitted to Nevada courts.
LPS’ misconduct was confirmed through testimony of former employees, interviews of servicers and other industry players, and extensive review of more than 1 million pages of relevant documents. Former employees and industry players describe LPS as an assembly-line sweatshop, churning out documents and foreclosures as fast as new requests came in and punishing network attorneys who failed to keep up the pace.
LPS is the nation’s largest provider of default mortgage services, processing more than fifty percent of all foreclosures annually.
The Office of the Nevada Attorney General recently indicted Gary Trafford and Gerri Sheppard as part of a separate, criminal investigation into the conduct of robo-signing scheme which resulted in the filing of tens of thousands of fraudulent documents with the Clark County Recorder’s Office between 2005 and 2008.
Nevada homeowners who are in foreclosure or are facing foreclosure are advised to seek assistance as soon as possible. Homeowners can find information for a counseling agency approved by the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD) by calling 800-569-4287 or by visiting http://1.usa.gov/NVCounselingAgencies.
Anyone who has information regarding this case should contact the Attorney General’s Office hotline at 702-486-3132 (when promoted select “0”) to obtain information on how to submit a written complain. Nevada consumers can file a complaint with the Nevada Attorney General’s Office about LPS by sending a letter with copies of any supporting documentation to the Nevada Office of the Attorney General, Bureau of Consumer Protection: 555 E. Washington Ave Suite 3900, Las Vegas, Nevada 89101
Read the complaint by visiting: http://bit.ly/LPScomplaint ###
This is your chance before your bosses throw you under the bus! Most of us understand you were told what to do and how to do it. Your bosses may have said you had a special “surrogate license” to sign away other co-workers names… but?
This isn’t limited to just Nevada.
Do yourself a favor and if you’re part of this epidemic file a complaint.
8NewsNow-
One of two accused home loan robo-signers faced a judge for the first time Wednesday. Former loan title officer Gerri Shepperd pleaded not guilty to more than 600 counts of fraud.
The Nevada Attorney General’s Office charged Shepperd with paying notaries to forge signatures on home loans to speed up the foreclosure process. The AG says this fraud affects tens of thousands of Nevada home loans.
Through the course of this investigation, I’ve learned that the name has been changed a number of times. Chicago Title being one of the names that was used. LPS, Lender Processing Services. LPS, Default Title & Closing, LSI Title, Fidelity National Default. It’s a variety of names.
Nevada state prosecutors are accusing three more Nevada notaries of falsely attesting to signatures on foreclosure documents filed in a broad mortgage fraud scheme.
Attorney General Catherine Cortez Masto announced Monday that Meghan Shaw, Jennifer Lowe and Joseph Noel were each charged with one charge of notarizing a signature of a person not in their presence. Court records filed last Wednesday refer to Lowe as Jennifer Bloecker.
that’s when they — well, upon us leaving
anyway, they took up our notary stamps and
everything and destroyed them. But I was
relieved of my duties once moved to
Gwinnett County.
Q. Who — who — I’m sorry, did I miss
that? Who destroyed those documents?
A. I can’t say exactly who destroyed
them. All I know is that Jeffrey
the supervisor in the signing room at that
times, he picked up everyone’s stamp, the
notaries’ stamps.
Q. He took your stamps?
A. He took our stamps. And — and
they were destroying them.
Q. How were they destroying them?
A. I don’t know how. He just said
they were picking up all the stamps, all
of the notary stamps. And they were going
to destroy them, because the company was
closing. And they were only suppose to be
used for that company.
Nov 30 (Reuters) – A key witness in a Nevada criminal foreclosure fraud case who was found dead on Monday apparently committed suicide, individuals close to the investigation of her death said.
Reuters reported on Tuesday that police had found the body of Tracy Lawrence, a notary, in her Las Vegas apartment shortly after she failed to appear in court for sentencing on a misdemeanor count related to the case.
The notary who signed tens of thousands of false documents in a massive robo-signing scandal case was found dead in her home on Monday.
The notary, 43-year-old Tracy Lawrence, was supposed to be in court at 8:30 Monday morning for her sentencing hearing. When her attorney did not hear from her for more than an hour, Sr. Deputy Attorney General Robert Giunta asked for a bench warrant to be issued for Lawrence. The judge denied the request.
Metro Homicide Detectives are working currently the case. It is unclear if her death was due to natural causes, or if it was a suicide or homicide. Last Monday, Lawrence pled guilty to only one criminal charge of notary fraud.
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