The Big Picture

By Barry Ritholtz – December 11th, 2010, 8:08AM

Sometimes, the best defense is a good offense.

That seems to be the approach that notorious robo-signing firm Nationwide Title Clearing has taken in responding to some of its critics.

If you are unfamiliar with their name, you might recall earlier this Fall when depositions of several Nationwide robo-signers employees went viral on YouTube (We mentioned these here and here).

This, amongst other perceived sleights has upset Nationwide Title, who has sued a St. Petersburg foreclosure defense lawyer, Matthew Weidner, for alleged libel and slander.

This is likely to be a terrible, terrible idea.

For those of you who are not attorneys, I need to point out a few things out about Libel and Slander laws in the United States. These are Constitutional issues, as the First Amendment protects speech, opinion, arguments, viewpoints, etc. In these cases, (capital “T”) Truth is an absolute defense. So if any defendant can demonstrate that the damaging statements were indeed, accurate, they win.

This case turns on the bizarre claim that the term robo-signer so libels the plaintiffs that they are entitled to damages. Given that Truth is a defense, the defendant will prevail if they can demonstrate Nationwide’s approach was robotic. Not literally machines doing the work, but any showing of assembly line manufacturing, for profit, of a streamlined document production that failed to review the documents, evaluate them, analyze the contents should qualify.

Here’s where things get very very interesting: In civil litigation, the discovery process provides lots of opportunities for a defendant to gather information related to the accusations to prove they are true. This is a very broad standard, and it means nearly anything relevant is fair game. Depositions of senior executives, the firm’s accounting and records, balance sheets, low level employees are all legitimate aspects of pre-trial discovery.

Why any private firm would subject themselves to this degree of scrutiny is quite baffling to me.

Links will return pending ACLU’s victory…

NATIONWIDE TITLE CLEARING VIDEO DEPOSITIONS

VIDEO DEPOSITION OF NATIONWIDE TITLE CLEARING BRYAN BLY

SFF EXCLUSIVE: VIDEO DEPOSITION OF NATIONWIDE TITLE CRYSTAL MOORE

VIDEO DEPOSITION OF NATIONWIDE TITLE CLEARING DHURATA DOKO

And FULL DEPOSITION TRANSCRIPT OF NATIONWIDE TITLE CLEARING ERICA LANCE BRYAN BLY

Continue below to ACLU’s reply below…

According to a Certification filed by NTC’s counsel, on November 17, 2010, the trial court contacted via e-mail and requested that a one-hour hearing be set on Friday, November 19^th, to hear the pending motions. App. Tab 10. NTC’s counsel learned that Mr. Forrest was traveling outside of the country and would not return until the following Monday, November 22^nd. Id. As NTC’s counsel explained: …

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EXCELLENT JOB! Now this is what I am talking about…no affidavits…it’s the “assignments”, the destroyed notes, the Break in Chain, the E-Signatures, no supervision!

By Prashant Gopal – Nov 15, 2010 12:00 AM ET

Bryan Bly is a pen-wielding “robo- signer” at Nationwide Title Clearing Inc., inking his name on an average 5,000 mortgage documents a day for companies such as Citigroup Inc. and JPMorgan Chase & Co.

Those are just the ones that cross his desk.

Nationwide Title employs a computer system that automatically inserts a copy of Bly’s signature on thousands of digital files that he never sees. The system even affixes an electronic notary seal.

“The problem with the way these documents are created isn’t because a computer is used,” said Gloria Einstein, a legal aid attorney in Green Cove Springs, Florida, who deposed Bly in a case in a which her client faces foreclosure by a unit of Deutsche Bank AG. “It’s because an enterprise has decided to use a computer to create a system where nobody is responsible for the information and the decisions.”

The rush to securitize more than $4 trillion of mortgages as U.S. home sales peaked in 2005 and 2006 inundated loan servicers and contractors like Palm Harbor, Florida-based Nationwide Title that help them handle paperwork. Lawsuits fighting some of the more than 4 million foreclosures since then have exposed sloppy recordkeeping and raised questions about the validity of documents used to seize properties.

Signatures Draw Scrutiny

Bly is just one of more than a dozen robo-signers deposed in the past two years by lawyers for borrowers seeking to block foreclosures. Spurred by descriptions in depositions of employees signing thousands of affidavits a week without checking their accuracy as legally required, the attorneys general in all 50 states last month opened an investigation into whether banks and loan servicers used faulty documents or improper practices to foreclose.

Nationwide Title, which has about 175 employees, provides document imaging, tracking, retrieval, recording and processing on bulk loan transfers for lenders, servicers and investors. It’s the largest third-party processor of mortgage assignments, handling more than 350,000 last year, Senior Vice President Jeremy Pomerantz said in a telephone interview. The company also prepares lien releases, which show that a mortgage has been paid off by the borrower.

Assignments, which are usually recorded with county land record departments, list the buyer and seller of a loan as it’s sold or packaged with other loans into a mortgage-backed security. Lawyers for homeowners are challenging the legitimacy of the documents, which are relied on by lenders to show they have the right to foreclose.

Batches of 30,000

(While closely held Nationwide Title in the past offered a package of foreclosure-specific services, it had just one client, Pomerantz said. The company doesn’t handle foreclosure affidavits — submitted by banks to assert ownership of a loan when they’ve lost the promissory note or to show that borrowers are in default — and often it doesn’t know when clients are requesting documents for defaulted loans, he said.)

Nationwide Title’s proprietary system isn’t entirely automated, said Erika Lance, senior vice president of administration. Employees receive requests from clients for lien releases and mortgage assignments, which are often sent in batches of as many as 30,000. They review the information and images of loan documents sent along with the request, and the information is keyed into the computer system.

The computer system fills in the electronic assignments in the format and wording each county requires, and places a signature and notary seal from a list of employees approved by each bank. Bly and other signers are given a title at the bank requesting the documents, such as “vice president” or “assistant secretary,” depending on what the individual counties require, Lance said.

Laws Catching Up

Mortgage Fraud

Bryan Bly
Nationwide Title Clearing

Action Date: November 8, 2010
Location: Palm Harbor, FL

The video-taped depositions of employees of Nationwide Title Clearing in Palm Harbor, Florida, were made available on the website Stop Foreclosure Fraud.

The deposition of Bryan Bly is particularly startling and straightforward. Bryan Bly signed documents and witnessed or notarized other documents. Bly testified that he did not witness the signatures he notarized. Bly signed in batches of 200. Bly signed approximately 5,000 mortgage assignments each day. Bly also signed as an officer of many lenders. Bly signed as an officer of over 20 banks and mortgage companies. His supervisors told him there were corporate resolutions authorizing him to sign using these titles. Bly had no knowledge of the information on the documents. Bly did not know what was meant by a mortgage assignment or an attorney-in-fact although he signed mortgage assignments as an officer of Citi Financial as attorney-in-fact for Argent Mortgage. He did not verify any information other than to make sure co-employees had signed their names so there were no blank lines on the documents. He has done this work for approximately 10 years.

One of the titles not discussed in the deposition, but used on tens of thousands of mortgage assignments signed by Bly was Attorney-In-Fact, Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation, as Receiver for IndyMac Federal Bank FSB, successor to IndyMac Mortgage Holdings, Inc. Bly continued to sign as Attorney-In-Fact for the FDIC as recently as June 25, 2010. A copy of an assignment signed by Bly as Attorney-In-Fact for the FDIC is available in the “Pleadings” section of Fraud Digest.

Excerpts:

9 Q Okay. So in this particular instance,
10 CitiMortgage was NTC’s client?
11 A Uh-huh.
12 Q And they contacted you to prepare an Assignment
13 of Mortgage; is that correct?
14 A They contacted us to prepare a group of
15 Assignments. It wasn’t just one.
16 Q How many is — let me start all over with that
17 one.
18 In this instance, how many did they ask you — or
19 did they send over at one time?
20 A I don’t have that number.
21 Q Would it be — and I’m not asking you to guess,
22 but if you do have a ballpark, would it have been dozens or
23 hundreds?
24 A Hundreds to thousands but I don’t know in this
25 particular case how many.
1 Q So — I’m sorry.
2 A I was going to say we’ve done over a hundred
3 thousand Assignments so. . .
4 Q So anywhere from a hundred — from hundreds to a
5 hundred thousand, they would send a request?
6 A They send them in groupings.
7 Q And when you say “they send them in groupings,”
8 that’s requests for Assignments of Mortgages —
9 A Yes.
10 Q — in groupings? Okay.
11 Right underneath the portion we just read,
12 there’s a — a CMI L number.

<SNIP>

7 Q And then we have “CitiMortgage as successor in
8 interest by merger to CitiFinancial Mortgage Company, Inc.,”
9 whose address is 1000 Technology Drive in O’Fallon,
10 Missouri —
11 A Uh-huh.
12 Q — assigning a mortgage together with a note to
13 Bayview Loan Services; is that correct?
14 A Yes.
15 Q Is this typically how Assignments of — or
16 transfer of notes occur through Assignment of Mortgage?
17 MS. PARSONS: Objection. You still have to
18 answer.
19 THE WITNESS: I still have to answer?
20 MS. PARSONS: If you know the answer.
21 THE WITNESS: Yeah. I’m sorry. Sorry.
22 MS. PARSONS: I just do it for the record, just
23 so you know.
24 THE WITNESS: Okay. Got it.
25 A To answer your question, on this particular case,
1 I don’t know what occurred on it because I was not part of
2 the — the sale or of the agreement between Bayview and
3 Citi. We were hired specifically to do Assignments.
4 Normally, this is an action recording at the
5 county to indicate a sale has taken place or a transfer of
6 loans has taken place from one entity to another.
7 Q (By Ms. Drysdale) So I’m not sure that — that
8 answered the question that I was asking.
9 This document is apparently assigning a note?
10 A Yes.
11 Q Is that correct?
12 A Yes.
13 Q And is it your understanding that that’s
14 generally how notes are transferred through Assignments?
15 A I’m trying to figure out how to answer this
16 question. It is my understanding that notes are transferred
17 through a sale agreement between mortgage entities. They
18 record Assignments to put on the record who the current
19 beneficiary is for that note and loan, that mortgage.
20 The — the Assignment itself is not the, to my
21 understanding, the actual sale of the loan. Does that make
22 sense?
23 Q Yes, ma’am.
24 A Okay. So that’s why I’m saying this is to
25 indicate that that event occurred and to record it at the
1 county recorder’s office as having occurred.
2 Q And you said that you were not part of these or
3 privy to the details of the sale from CitiMortgage to
4 Bayview; is that correct?
5 A Correct.
6 Q That you were just asked to prepare a document?
7 A Prepare Assignments, yes.
8 Q Okay. Further down, still on the left hand side,
9 we see the signature of Bryan Bly as vice president?
10 A Yes.
11 Q And is Bryan Bly someone who you supervise?
12 A Directly, no.
13 Q But he is an employee of Nationwide Title
14 Clearing?
15 A Correct.
16 Q Who is his supervisor?
17 A Elsa McKinnon.
18 Q Could you spell that, please?
19 A E-L-S-A M-C-K-I-N-N-O-N.
20 Q When you and I spoke earlier, you indicated
21 that — that you might be a better person to provide
22 information about this Assignment than Mr. Bly; do you
23 recall that?
24 A Yes.
25 Q And — and why did you think that you rather than
1 his supervisor could be explain what —
2 A Because the questions that you were asking in
3 your affidavit did not just have to do with him signing the
4 direct document. You — the questions pertained also to our
5 overall procedure and our connection with CitiMortgage,
6 which are questions that he can’t answer.
7 Q So then let’s talk a little about what Mr. Bly —
8 what he actually does in executing an Assignment of
9 Mortgage. Can you go through that process with me?
10 A Yeah. He is what we refer to as a signer. He is
11 somebody at Nationwide who is designated to execute
12 documents.
13 Q So just can you give me a general idea of what
14 his — his day-to-day activities would be?
15 A He signs and notarizes documents.
16 Q So when he comes in in the morning, he sat — he
17 sits at his desk, and that’s pretty much all he does all
18 day?
19 A Yes.
20 Q Is sign and notarize documents?
21 A Yes.
22 Q Assignments of Mortgage?
23 A Assignments of Mortgage, Lien Releases.
24 Q Does he actually research any of the information
25 contained in the Assignment of Mortgage?
1 A No.
2 Q No?
3 A No.
4 Q About how many documents, including Assignments
5 of Mortgage, would he sign in the average day?
6 A A couple thousand.
7 Q And — and this — is he permanently employed?
8 Well, let me ask that question in a different way.
9 Is his — his employer — his present employer
10 and business address is Nationwide Title at 2100 Alt. 19
11 North; is that correct?
12 A Yeah. He’s presently a full-time employee with
13 Nationwide Title Clearing.
14 Q Okay. In the assign — the Corey Assignment of
15 Mortgage, he lists his address as 10000 [sic] Technology
16 Drive, O’Fallon, Missouri.
17 Why is that particular address used?
18 A That has to do with the question on how Bryan Bly
19 can sign as a vice president as well.
20 Q Okay.
21 A So the answer to that question has to do with a
22 corporate resolution.
23 Q Do you have that document with you?
24 A Yes.
25 Q May I take a look at that?

<SNIP>

8 Q Do you have a copy of the indemnity agreement?
9 A No. I did not bring that with me.
10 Q But that’s something that is in possession of
11 Nationwide?
12 A Yes.
13 Q And so when Mr. Bly is executing the couple
14 thousand of Assignments a day, that is the extent of his —
15 that’s the extent of his duties as vice president?
16 A Uh-huh — yes, sorry, or assistant secretary. It
17 just depends on what’s required at the county. He could be
18 listed as either or.
19 Q So does Nationwide have a chart of all the
20 counties in Florida to know whether or not Mr. Bly is
21 supposed to be a vice president or assistant secretary?
22 A We have a list of all the counties in the entire
23 United States that tells us that.
24 Q So Mr. Bly executes Assignments of Mortgage to be
25 recorded all over the United States?
1 A And Lien Releases.
2 Q And Lien Releases.
3 Does he hold that position as vice president for
4 any other companies other than CitiMortgage?
5 A Yes.
6 Q What other companies?
7 A There are many, and I don’t know if I can just
8 release all of the names of them.
9 Q Okay.
10 A But for all of our clients where we sign, he is
11 listed as one of the signers.
12 Q Previously you said that the consent of the
13 executive committee was the reason for the — the address
14 being listed as a 1000 Technology Drive.
15 Could you expound upon that?
16 A Yeah. He’s acting as the capacity as the vice
17 president for that company, and that is the address of that
18 company.
19 Q So he’s not physically located in Missouri? He
20 just —
21 A No. He’s physically located in Florida.
22 Q He just lists that as his address for purposes of
23 this Assignment of Mortgage?
24 A Correct.
25 Q And who is Christopher Jones?
1 A Christopher Jones is an employee of Nationwide
2 Title Clearing.
3 Q And what are his day-to-day duties?
4 A He also works in the processing area. One of the
5 duties he has is he is one of our signers and one of our
6 notaries.
7 Q Does Mr. Bly also work in the processing
8 department?
9 A That’s the department, yeah.
10 Q Is Mr. Bly also a notary?
11 A Yes.
12 Q Down at the bottom of the Corey Assignment it
13 says that the document was prepared by Jessica Fretwell?
14 A Yes.
15 Q Do you know Ms. Fretwell?
16 A Yes.
17 Q And is she also an employee of Nationwide?
18 A Yes, she is.
19 Q And what is her job description?
20 A She works in our quality control division.
21 Q What are her day-to-day responsibilities?
22 A How to do with the establishment of the forms and
23 the county requirements.
24 Q When you say “the establishment of the forms,”
25 what do you mean by that?

<SNIP>

15 Q Okay. So Mr. Bly didn’t actually sign the Corey
16 Assignment; is that correct?
17 A Well, he didn’t physically sign it, but he —
18 that meets with the standards for electronic document
19 recording.
20 Q Okay. Are you referring to a specific state or
21 federal law?
22 A This — no. Specific counties across the nation
23 have started setting it up, so part of like going more green
24 and not having as much paperwork that you can electronically
25 record documents. They have different settings anywhere
1 from just feeding them information to feeding them like a
2 PDF or TIF version of the document that gets recorded, that
3 they record in their imaging bank, stamped electronically,
4 and then send back to us as having been recorded once it’s
5 verified on their side. That document was one of those.
6 Q Yes, ma’am. I understand how it was recorded
7 electronically. I’m just trying to — to determine whether
8 or not Mr. Bly actually signed a physical document or if
9 a — his signature was created by Planat Press.
10 A The signature was included by Planat Press
11 because that document was never printed out.
12 Q So did Mr. Bly review the document before it was
13 sent for electronic recording?
14 A No.
15 Q So — and I’m now — I continue to refer to the
16 Corey Assignment.
17 Mr. Bly never saw the Corey Assignment prior to
18 it being recorded; is that correct?
19 A Correct.

<SNIP>

Q What about Crystal Moore? She — is she also a
7 signer?
8 A She is also a signer and a notary.
9 Q And a notary.
10 And her practices are the same as you’ve
11 described with Mr. Bly as far as how she — what her daily
12 duties are in executing documents?
13 A Yes.
14 Can I ask why you’re asking about Crystal Moore
15 because her name’s not on any of the documentation regarding
16 this.
17 Q I just saw her name on the Consent of the
18 Executive Committee we marked as 3.
19 A Uh-huh.
20 Q So are all of the names on Exhibit 3, the Joint
21 Consent, are they all signers?
22 A You mean is their job duty?
23 Q Yes, ma’am.

[ipaper docId=40648569 access_key=key-3ay7qzdw24j55o1c3kd height=600 width=600 /]

False Statements

Bryan Bly
Green Tree Servicing, LLC
Bill Koch
Law Offices of Marshall Watson
Nationwide Title Clearing
PNC Bank
Richmond Monroe Group
Select Portfolio Servicing, Inc.

Action Date: October 8, 2010
Location: Palm Harbor, FL

On October 7, 2010, PNC Bank reportedly announced that it was suspending foreclosures for 30 days. An examination of the Affidavits and Assignments filed by PNC shows why it may have decided on this action. For documents needed to foreclose, PNC relied heavily for the last two years on Nationwide Title Clearing in Palm Harbor, Florida and Select Portfolio Servicing in Salt Lake City, Utah. Nationwide Title Clearing (“NTC”) was one of the first companies to come under fire for using robo-signers. Bryan Bly, the most famous robo-signer at NTC, signed thousands of Assignments and Affidavits as “Vice-President, PNC Bank, as successor by merger National City Bank, successor by merger Harbor Federal Savings Bank.” On many documents, an Ohio address appears underneath Bly’s signature. Bly, however, was never a Vice President of PNC. This was just one of the many titles Bly used so that NTC could produce documents needed for foreclosures. On other documents, during the same time period, Bly claimed to be Assistant Vice President of Select Portfolio Services; Vice President of Citi Residential Lending; Vice President of Suntrust Mortgage; and Assistant Vice President of National City Bank. In interviews, Bly admitted that he did not have time to read the documents he signed. Despite claiming to be an officer of Select Portfolio Services, Bly is not listed as an officer on the records of the Florida Secretary of State. Despite listing addresses in Ohio and Utah, Bly’s signature is always notarized in Pinellas County, Florida, the actual location of NTC. Bly’s many titles are often notarized by the same notary who claims to have personal knowledge that Bly is, in fact, an officer of these many companies. PNC also regularly used Select Portfolio Services (“SPS”) in Salt Lake City, Utah as a servicer. Bill Koch of SPS has the same problems as Bly – using too many titles and signing thousands of documents each week. Bly also signs for Green Tree Servicing, LLC, but the Green Tree address is listed as c/o NTC in Palm Harbor, Florida. In recent months, PNC has also regularly used Richmond Monroe Group in Missouri as its servicer. The frequent signer for Richmond Monroe Group is Renee Durham who is identified as “officer.” It is very unlikely that PNC can review all of the foreclosures with questionable documents in 30 days. In Florida, PNC has most often used The Law Offices of Marshall Watson, a law firm under investigation by the Florida Attorney General, to foreclose.

Remember this from 6/20/2010?

By DinSFLA 6/20/2010

Now if this isn’t another means to a massive mandatory recall for any of this robo-signer’s documents, then our judicial systems are playing with an enormous fire getting ready to ignite even more angry individuals who has his documents sworn into court!

Then again, they’re one of the same.

Today Susan Taylor Martin for Tampabay.com wrote an interesting article about a too too familiar robo-signer “Bryan J. Bly”.

In this article She states

“Over the past few years, Bly has signed countless mortgage assignments as either a notary public or “vice president” of various lenders.

In reality, Bly works for Nationwide Title Clearing, a Palm Harbor company. And he was recently reprimanded by state regulators after acknowledging in a sworn statement that Nationwide Title had him notarizing so many documents that he scribbled his initial instead of signing his full name as required by law.

Such a pace, critics say, shows that Bly and other so-called “robo signers” can’t possibly be sure that what they’re signing is accurate.”

Just by these statements alone why aren’t any of these assignments or any documents executed by Mr. Bly being pulled out from court shelves?

It’s quite simple and you don’t need to be an Einstein.

If there is a product that is shown to cause human any harm there is a mandatory recall. So where is this recall on these products? Where on earth is the government to put a stop to all this assembly line?

Does it have to take a Chinese toymaker with toxic paint, a drywall that deteriorates the guts of a home and possibly lead to possible health issues or how about a Japanese car manufacturer that makes faulty brakes? Again, where is the authority looking into these claims? And why are they NOT pulling these defective items out of our records  in the court houses? Exactly who is being notified that these documents can cause harm to you or that if you were a victim of such irresponsibility to come forward?

My point is these documents are making one extremely ill, homeless and even in some cases suicidal. If this isn’t harm than what is?

This is just wrong in every possible way! Fraud is Fraud.

False Statements

Florida Default Law Group
Jeffrey Stephans

Action Date: September 14, 2010
Location: West Palm Beach, FL

On September 14, 2010, Florida Default Law Group filed “Notices” in foreclosure actions that the firm was withdrawing Affidavits it had previously filed. The Affidavits were signed by Jeffrey Stephan of GMAC Mortgage/Homecomings Financial in Montgomery County, PA. Stephan had previously admitted in depositions that he signed thousands of such affidavits each month with no knowledge of the contents and in many cases without even bothering to read the Affidavits. In the Notices, Florida Default claimed that “the undersigned law firm was not aware” that the Stephans Affidavits were improper and had a good faith belief in the Stephans Affidavits. Stephans signed so many Affidavits, however, on behalf of so many different securitized trusts, that his lack of actual knowledge should have been obvious. Many other mortgage servicing companies and foreclosure firms have filed thousands of other worthless, unfounded Affidavits. Perhaps the Law Offices of Marshall Watson will notify courts that Lost Note Affidavits signed by Linda Green, Tywanna Thomas and Korell Harp are also improper; perhaps The Law Offices of David Stern will notify Courts that their own office manager, Cheryl Samons, had no knowledge and did not even read the Affidavits she signed. The dark days of the foreclosure “robo-signers” seem to finally be coming to an end in Florida. Will the same judges who accepted thousands of these worthless Affidavits now believe the allegations that the foreclosure law firms acted in good faith when they presented these documents to Courts? An example of the Notice filed by Florida Default is available in the “Pleadings” section of this site. Highlights from the deposition of Jeffrey Stephan are available in the “Articles” section. Scott Anderson, Bryan Bly, Margaret Dalton, Erica Johnson-Seck, Crystal Moore and the other professional signers may finally be held accountable for their sworn false statements.

Affidavit in question below courtesy of ForeclosureHamlet:

[ipaper docId=37452927 access_key=key-1adz01qek3zbdb25hukl height=600 width=600 /]

Read more on…Jeffery Stephan

By Lynn E. Szymoniak, Esq. Ed., Fraud Digest (www.frauddigest.com) July 18, 2010

These are highlights from the deposition of Jeffrey B. Stephan, taken June 7, 2010, in a foreclosure case in Maine, Federal National Mortgage Association v. Nicole M. Bradbury, et al., Maine District Court, District Nine, Division of Northern Cumberland, Docket No. BRI-RE-09-65. The deposition was taken by Attorney Thomas Cox of Portland, Maine.

Jeffrey Stephan says his current title is team leader of the document execution team for GMAC. He estimates that he signs between 8,000 and 12,000 documents monthly. He supervises a team of 14 employees.

Mortgage Assignments and Affidavits in support of Summary Judgment signed by Stephan have been used by GMAC, FANNIE & FREDDIE in over 100,000 foreclosure cases.

“LPS” in the last line refers to Lender Processing Services in Jacksonville, Florida.

In a previous deposition, Stephan stated that the notaries who notarize his signature are often not actually present in the room with him when he signs documents.

Despite all of the mounting evidence and admissions, Jeffrey Stephan, Scott Anderson, Bryan Bly, Linda Green, Erica Johnson-Seck, Christina Trowbridge and the other “bank officers” employed by the companies serving the securitized
mortgage-backed trust industry will be back at their desks Monday morning, pens (or rubber stamps) in hand.

Page 16-17, Lines 17-25, 2-11

Q: What training have you received?

A: I received side-by-side training from another team leader to instruct me on how to review the documents when they are received from my staff.

Q: Who was that person?

A: That person, at the time, I believe, was a gentleman named Kenneth Ugwuadu. U-G-W-U-A-D-U. He is no longer with GMAC.

Q: How long did that training last?

A: Three days.

Q: Were there any written or printed training materials or manuals used as apart of that training?

A: No.

Page 20, Lines 19-24:

Q.: In your capacity as the team leader for the document execution team, do you have any role in the foreclosure process, other than the signing of documents?

A: No.

Page 54, Lines 12-25:

Q: When you sign a summary judgment affidavit, do you check to see if all of the exhibits are attached to it?

A: No.

Q. Does anybody in your department check to see if all the exhibits are attached to it at the time that it is presented to you for your signature?

A: No.

Q: When you sign a summary judgment affidavit, do you inspect any exhibits attached to it?

A: No.

Page 62-63, Lines 23-25, 2-6:

Q: Is it fair to say when you sign a summary judgment affidavit, you don’t know what information it contains, other than the figures that are set forth within it?

A: Other than the borrower’s name, and if I have signing authority for that entity, that is correct.

Page 69, Lines 2-20:

Q: Mr. Stephan, referring you again to the bottom line on Page 1 of Exhibit 1, it states: I have under my custody and control, the records relating to the mortgage transaction referenced below.

It’s correct, is it not, that you did not have in your custody any records of GMAC at the time that you signed a summary judgment affidavit?

A: I have the electronic record. I do not have papers.

Q: You have access to a computer, is that what you mean?

A: Yes.
(objections omitted)

Page 45, Lines 2-11:

Q: Mr. Stephan, do you recall testifying in your Florida deposition in December with regard to your employees, and you said, quote, they do not go into the system and verify that the information is accurate?

A: That is correct.

Page 41, Line 19:

Q: Do your employees have any direct communication with outside counsel?

A: Yes, through the LPS System.

Please click on Fraud Digest’s logo to read more articles like this.

Here is the Deposition Below:

Via: 4closurefraud

[ipaper docId=33129394 access_key=key-2ml8jt9qwzgk3qgg0qr0 height=600 width=600 /]

By DinSFLA 6/20/2010

Now if this isn’t another means to a massive mandatory recall for any of this robo-signer’s documents, then our judicial systems are playing with an enormous fire getting ready to ignite even more angry individuals who has his documents sworn into court!

Then again, they’re one of the same.

Today Susan Taylor Martin for Tampabay.com wrote an interesting article about a too too familiar robo-signer “Bryan J. Bly”.

In this article She states

“Over the past few years, Bly has signed countless mortgage assignments as either a notary public or “vice president” of various lenders.

In reality, Bly works for Nationwide Title Clearing, a Palm Harbor company. And he was recently reprimanded by state regulators after acknowledging in a sworn statement that Nationwide Title had him notarizing so many documents that he scribbled his initial instead of signing his full name as required by law.

Such a pace, critics say, shows that Bly and other so-called “robo signers” can’t possibly be sure that what they’re signing is accurate.”

Just by these statements alone why aren’t any of these assignments or any documents executed by Mr. Bly being pulled out from court shelves?

It’s quite simple and you don’t need to be an Einstein.

If there is a product that is shown to cause human any harm there is a mandatory recall. So where is this recall on these products? Where on earth is the government to put a stop to all this assembly line?

Does it have to take a Chinese toymaker with toxic paint, a drywall that deteriorates the guts of a home and possibly lead to possible health issues or how about a Japanese car manufacturer that makes faulty brakes? Again, where is the authority looking into these claims? And why are they NOT pulling these defective items out of our records  in the court houses? Exactly who is being notified that these documents can cause harm to you or that if you were a victim of such irresponsibility to come forward?

My point is these documents are making one extremely ill, homeless and even in some cases suicidal. If this isn’t harm than what is?

This is just wrong in every possible way! Fraud is Fraud.