The Bristol County Board of Commissioners received a letter from Attorney Garrett Bradley notifying them that a complaint against Mortgage Electronic Registration Systems (MERS) was filed in Suffolk County on March 29.
Previously, the commissioners voted on Feb. 14 to file a lawsuit to reclaim millions of dollars from MERS for allegedly skirting public recording laws at the expense of the county’s three property registries.
Bristol County is joining Norfolk and Plymouth counties in filing lawsuits against MERS.
Commissioners have previously said the county won’t know exactly how much money they are looking to collect until the discovery process of litigation.
Plymouth County has filed a class-action lawsuit against a national electronic mortgage registry company it says has enabled banks to avoid paying Iowa mortgage recording fees.
Plymouth County Attorney Darin Raymond filed the suit on behalf of all 99 Iowa counties against MERSCORP Holdings Inc. and Mortgage Electronic Registration Systems Inc., known as MERS, which tracks mortgages sold and traded among banks that subscribe to the company’s service. The suit also names several of the nation’s largest banks and mortgage companies.
In the lawsuit, Raymond said MERS has allowed banks to skirt Iowa’s public information and recording laws by trading mortgages through an electronic registry that lists MERS as the mortgage holder, even though the banks are buying and selling the mortgages.
New York government officials are continuing their assault against foreclosure actions where Mortgage Electronic Registration Systems, Inc. (“MERS”) was the assignee of the mortgage, and challenges to foreclosures involving MERS are increasingly gaining traction in New York courts. Recently, the New York State Attorney General filed a complaint against MERS and several banks alleging fraud and deception in foreclosure proceedings. People v. JPMorgan Chase Bank N.A., No. 2012/2768 (N.Y. Sup. Ct. Feb. 3, 2012). In addition, three New York trial courts have decided motions involving standing and other issues in such actions. CIT Group/Consumer Fin., Inc. v. Platt, 33 Misc. 3d 1231(A) (N.Y. Sup. Ct. 2011); U.S. Bank N.A. v. Bressler, 33 Misc. 3d 1231(A) (N.Y. Sup. Ct. 2011); Bank of New York Mellon v. Martinez, 33 Misc. 3d 1215(A) (N.Y. Sup. Ct. 2011). Two courts ruled against the foreclosing banks, finding they did not have standing to foreclose where MERS assigned a mortgage without express authority to do so or sufficient documentation evidencing that the note was also transferred. Although the third court dismissed a lack of standing defense, it did so solely for procedural reasons.
Each and every time I read a case where a judge mentions MERS, I cringe only because MERS is a strawman/machine that was made up, fabricated to circumvent not only fees but property law.
It’s a machine anyone who has access can manipulate at any given time. It’s unreliable & inaccurate.
My San Antonio-
A lawsuit filed last month by Bexar County against a Boerne mortgage banker alleging the county’s public recording system was circumvented to avoid the paying of filing fees is about more than just unpaid fees. The outcome of the lawsuit could have a far-reaching impact on how real estate transactions continue to be recorded in Texas and across the country.
The Bexar County lawsuit against JPC Financial Resources Inc. challenges the use of the Mortgage Electronic Registration System created in the 1990s by the nation’s 3,000 largest lenders to record mortgage transactions. The suit seeks unspecified damages.
The Bristol County Board of Commissioners moved on Tuesday to file a lawsuit to reclaim millions of dollars from Mortgage Electronic Registration Systems, commonly known as MERS, for allegedly skirting public recording laws at the expense of the county’s three property registries.
Commissioner John Mitchell said Bristol County is joining with Norfolk and Plymouth counties in filing lawsuits against MERS.
“MERS has hidden all the assignment of mortgages,” Mitchell said. “This (lawsuit) is to get fees back for the recording of assignments of mortgages. You don’t know how many times they did it. They did it privately. Supposedly, somewhere, this MERS has a registry of their own assignments of mortgages which show who is the true owner of a mortgage, except I guess in practice they don’t really have it. And that’s been a problem with foreclosures. When a bankruptcy court says, ‘Who owns the mortgage now?,’ they haven’t always been able to come up with it.”
Mitchell said it has been a “substantial” problem, but the county won’t be sure about how much money they are actually looking to collect until the discovery process of litigation — rough estimates put together by county registries last year indicate that the loss of revenue ranges well into the millions of dollars.
The investigation concerns whether the Company or its fiduciaries breached their fiduciary duties by improperly processing mortgages and mortgage foreclosures. A civil lawsuit filed in December 2011 by the Office of the Attorney General of the State of Nevada alleges that LPS and certain of its subsidiaries: (1) engaged in a pattern and practice of falsifying, forging and/or fraudulently executing foreclosure related documents, resulting in numerous foreclosures that were predicated upon deficient documentation; (2) fraudulently notarized documents without ensuring that the notary did so in the presence of the person signing the document; (3) implemented a widespread scheme to forge signatures on key documents, to ensure that volume and speed quotas were met; (4) concealed the scope and severity of the fraud by misrepresenting that the problems were limited to clerical errors; (5) 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; (6) improperly obstructed communication between foreclosure attorneys and their clients; and (7), 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.
Wells Fargo & Co. directors must face investors’ claims that largest U.S. mortgage lender failed to properly disclose details of its foreclosure practices to government investigators, a judge ruled.
U.S. District Judge Susan Illston in San Francisco rejected Wells Fargo’s request to dismiss shareholders’ allegations that directors wrongfully failed to disclose their opposition to a government probe of the bank’s mortgage lending and foreclosure policies.
“The fact that the company was allegedly stymieing the government regulators is certainly material to stockholders when considering whether to authorize a more serious internal investigation,” Illston said in Feb. 9 ruling.
MADIGAN FILES SUIT OVER FAULTY MORTGAGE ASSIGNMENTS FILED WITH COUNTY RECORDERS
Attorney General Alleges Faulty Practices in Foreclosing on
Homeowners in Crisis
Chicago — Attorney General Lisa Madigan today filed a lawsuit against Nationwide Title Clearing for filing faulty documents with Illinois county recorders. Nationwide Title Cleaning Inc. (NTC) is a Florida-based company that prepares documents for mortgage servicers to use against borrowers who are in default, foreclosure or bankruptcy.
“The practices that NTC used were a key contributor to the mortgage crisis by undermining the integrity and accuracy of the mortgage servicing and foreclosure process,” Attorney General Madigan said.
NTC provides a range of mortgage loan services to eight of the top 10 lenders and mortgage servicers in the country. NTC specializes in creating, processing and recording mortgage assignments, which are often used for a lender to foreclose on a borrower.
The lawsuit, filed in Cook County Circuit Court, alleges numerous violations of the Illinois Consumer Fraud and Deceptive Practices Act and the Uniform Deceptive Trade Practices Act. Madigan is asking the court to require NTC to review and correct all documents it unlawfully created and recorded in Illinois, and pay back all revenues, profits and gains achieved in whole or in part due to unlawful practices. The suit also asks the court to impose civil penalties against the company.
Lawyers for the IndyMac executives say the FDIC is required by law to retain all the records of a failed bank it takes over for six years.
WSJ-
A pair of former IndyMac executives being sued by the Federal Deposit Insurance Corp. are accusing the bank regulator of a “stunning display of incompetence” for failing to preserve some evidence when it took over receivership of the failed bank.
Lawyers for onetime midlevel IndyMac executives Kenneth Shellem and Richard Koon say the FDIC failed to collect and preserve documents and emails after taking receivership of IndyMac following the bank’s 2008 collapse, leaving the pair handicapped in mounting their defense.
Oh my, look what we have here…big mistake because I don’t think this is going very far….his franchises that is.
Bill Warner Private Investigator-
My source in Fort Lauderdale tells me that attorney David J. Stern has rolled over his $Millions in foreclosure home profits and the cash he got up front from the DJSP Entreprises Inc. FKA Chardan 2008 China Acquisition Corp deal into at least 150 Five Guys Burger and Fries Franchise’s, will that be fries with your meal sir?
It appears that David J. Stern is buying ”Five Guys Burger and Fries Franchise’s” in bulk, Stern is trying to acquire 500 Burger Joints NATIONWIDE…
Lawsuit: ‘Profits Were Running the Show’ at Leading Credit Ratings Agency
Illinois Attorney General-
Attorney General Lisa Madigan today filed a lawsuit against Standard & Poor’s for its fraudulent role in assigning its highest ratings to risky mortgage-backed investments in the years leading up to the housing market crash.
Madigan filed her lawsuit today in Cook County Circuit Court, alleging that Standard & Poor’s, or S&P, compromised its independence as a ratings agency by doling out high ratings to unworthy, risky investments as a corporate strategy to increase its revenue and market share. The Attorney General’s lawsuit alleges that S&P ignored the increasing risks posed by mortgage-backed securities, instead giving the investment pools ratings that were favorable to its investment bank client base and S&P’s profits.
“Publically, S&P took every opportunity to proclaim their analyses and ratings as independent, objective and free from its desire for revenue,” Madigan said. “Yet privately, S&P abandoned its principles and instead used every trick possible to give deals high ratings in order to retain clients and generate revenue. The mortgage-backed securities that helped our market soar – and ultimately crash – could not have been purchased by most investors without S&P’s seal of approval.”
The Attorney General’s lawsuit cites numerous internal emails and conversations among S&P employees in the run up to the housing market’s crash that demonstrate the company misrepresented its ratings as objective and independent. In one such exchange, in April 2007, an online conversation via a company-based instant messenger application revealed employees discussing S&P ratings compared to the reality of risk involved, with an employee stating an investment “could be structured by cows and we would rate it.”
ATLANTA (CN) – Mortgage Electronic Registration Systems claims William Davidson deceptively incorporated his Mortgage Electronic Registration Systems in Georgia, causing people to believe they had properly served the real MERS by sending notice to Davidson. MERS seeks punitive damages on six counts, including bad faith, theft by deception, trespass/conversion, deceptive trade and trademark violations. MERS claims Davidson incorporated his own MERS with a principal place of business at his home address in Lawrenceville, Ga. The true MERS is a Delaware corporation developed by Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac which “serves as the mortgagee or beneficiary on more than 70 million mortgages, deeds of trust, and security deeds for properties across the country, more than 2.3 million of which are located in Georgia,” according to the federal complaint. MERS says Davidson incorporated his copycat business on March 10, 2011 in Georgia.
Folks, please tweet, forward, whatever. This is a huge story that deserves to be given major coverage in MSM. Local judges need to be aware that they are being handed forged documents.
Stern pocketed some $60 million from that deal. The investors got the company and all its documents, internal procedures and everything you would need in order to find out what really happened within the Stern document mill.
A little after 8 AM EST today, a filing went up on the SEC’s Edgar database. It’s a Complaint in lawsuit, dated yesterday.
Action Date: January 4, 2012 Location: FT. Lauderdale, FL
In the lawsuit filed by DJSP Enterprises against David J. Stern and the Law Offices of David J. Stern, there are also allegations involving ProVest, the process server used by Stern and most of the other major foreclosure mills hired by Lender Processing Services in over 20 states.
36. Prior to the Transaction, the Seller Defendants also knowingly and systematically inflated their process of service costs to the Court. Specifically, Seller Defendants engineered a fraudulent scheme whereby they directed their process servicing work to a process servicing company called ProVest. The Seller Defendants caused each file to generate four or five separate fees for service of process regardless of whether service of process on multiple defendants was necessary or appropriate and regardless of whether service of process for multiple defendants could be achieved at the same address.
37. In exchange for receiving these inflated service of process fees, ProVest, in turn, routinely referred back to PTA servicing requests for “skip tracing” to locate defendants for whom ProVest purportedly did not have accurate street address information to effect service of process. ProVest “hired” and paid fees to PTA for “skip tracing” services despite the fact that ProVest had the ability and resources to perform “skip tracing” itself and routinely did so itself.
38. The Seller Defendants’ arrangement with ProVest amounted to a kickback scheme. DS Law padded and inflated its process servicing costs which were billed to its clients and added to the court costs assessed to foreclosure defendants. In exchange for feeding this work to ProVest, PTA earned manufactured “skip tracing” fees which inflated PTA’s revenues and profits and which represented another way in which the Seller Defendants artificially inflated the revenues of the Target Business prior to the Transaction.
Action Date: January 4, 2012 Location: FT. Lauderdale, FL
DJSP Enterprises, the publicly-traded company that was supposed to make millions for investors from the foreclosure services it provided to The Law Offices of David Stern (“the Stern Firm”), sued David J. Stern and the Law Offices of David Stern.
Stern Law mortgage foreclosure caseload rose from 15,000 in 2006 to 70,400 in 2009.
In 2009, Stern Law handled 20% of all foreclosures in Florida.
Stern Law’s clients included all 10 of the top 10, and 17 of the top 20 mortgage servicers in the U.S. including Fannie, Freddie, Citibank, BOA, Goldman Sachs, GMAC and Wells Fargo.
The non-legal, back room servicers related to foreclosures included REO services: property inspection, valuation, eviction, broker assignment – these were performed by DJSP Enterprises – the sole client was Stern Law.
29. The Seller Defendants fraudulently induced Plaintiffs DAL and DJSP into entering into the Transaction by fraudulently and artificially inflating the Target Business’ actual revenues, by intentionally failing to disclose that the Target Business and DS Law were not, in fact, operating in accordance with all applicable laws, and by concealing that DS Law was in jeopardy of losing its largest clients due to DS Law’s unlawful conduct. Indeed, before entering into the Transaction, the Seller Defendants knew that DS Law and the Target Business had been systematically falsifying and/or back-dating pertinent legal documents, submitting such documents to the courts, routinely misplacing and losing original key documents, filing foreclosures with inaccurate and/or incomplete documents, prosecuting foreclosure cases without obtaining proper service of process, and were in jeopardy of losing the Seller Defendants’ largest foreclosure clients due to such conduct.
30. By cutting corners in the foreclosure process without following the rule of law, the Defendants artificially reduced the expenses of the Target Business which falsely inflated the profitability of the Target Business.
31. To summarize, the Seller Defendants failed to disclose to DJSP and DAL that DS Law and the Target Business were systematically operating in an unlawful manner. In addition, the Seller Defendants failed to disclose to DJSP and DAL that the Target Business’ reported revenues were not accurate, inflated, and improperly calculated and that the expenses of the business were also distorted due to the systematic practices designed to “shorten” the legal process. The Seller Defendants falsely led DAL and DJSP to believe that they were acquiring a long-term profitable business that operated in accordance with all applicable laws to induce DAL and DJSP to enter into the Transaction.
33. Prior to the Transaction, the Seller Defendants were at all times well aware that DS Law and the Target Business were intentionally perpetuating a fraud on the courts by, inter alia, systematically filing forged documents, forging signatures on such documents, fraudulently backdating documents, improperly notarizing and witnessing documents, fabricating documents, signing affidavits without reviewing or verifying the information contained therein, prosecuting foreclosure cases without obtaining proper service of process, and filing foreclosures with inaccurate and/or incomplete documents.
34. Indeed, the Seller Defendants directed employees of DS Law and the Target Business to purposefully overlook glaring inaccuracies in foreclosure pleadings and to essentially rubber stamp computer generated documents without reviewing or verifying the accuracy of the documents. New attorneys at DS Law were not only encouraged, but were even ordered to sign legal filings and pleadings without reading them. As a result, false and inaccurate documents were routinely executed and filed with the courts in an effort to hasten foreclosure proceedings and illegally obtain final judgments of foreclosure for the Seller Defendants’ clients.
35. The Seller Defendants even incentivized these unscrupulous and unlawful practices by giving their employees bonuses and extravagant gifts for churning out the highest number of foreclosure cases in the least amount of time. The Seller Defendants encouraged contests between DS Law attorneys to see who could jam a foreclosure case through the courts the fastest.
If you act like a bank, you think like a bank …you’ll think you’re above the law as well.
National Mortgage News-
The Federal Housing Finance Agency believes California Attorney General Kamala Harris is pestering Fannie Mae with stupid questions. Whether that opinion is enough justification for the government-sponsored enterprise to ignore her queries is to be determined.
Earlier in the week Harris filed suit in San Francisco Superior Court, seeking to force Fannie to respond to a lengthy list of questions about defaulted loans it guarantees in the state and other matters. Appended to the filing is a letter from Arnold & Porter attorneys representing the FHFA, who argue that the agency’s authority over Fannie shield it from California’s questions.
California Attorney General Kamala D. Harris filed suit against Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac on Tuesday, seeking to force the firms to answer a detailed list of questions after the firms’ federal regulator sought to block an open-ended inquiry by the state.
The lawsuits, filed in San Francisco County Superior Court, are the latest salvo by Ms. Harris against the mortgage-finance giants and their regulator, the Federal Housing Finance Agency.
Last month, the office issued subpoenas asking the firms to provide extensive answers to a range of questions about the mortgages they purchased and the foreclosed properties they own in California.
FHFA Sues the City of Chicago Over Vacant Buildings Ordinance
Washington, DC –
The Federal Housing Finance Agency (FHFA), on its own behalf and as Conservator for Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac (the Enterprises), has filed a lawsuit in the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of Illinois against the city of Chicago to prevent enforcement of the city’s recently amended “Vacant Buildings Ordinance” against the Enterprises. FHFA reluctantly took this action after undertaking efforts to discuss these matters and to seek alternative solutions to the problem of vacant properties that the ordinance seeks to address. FHFA indicated that the ordinance could affect costs for homeowners in the city.
The ordinance would impose on the Enterprises the responsibilities, but not the benefits, of ownership of vacant property on which they hold mortgages. The ordinance would create risks and liabilities for the Enterprises at a time when they are already supported by taxpayers, including those in the city of Chicago. Additionally, the ordinance would subject the Enterprises to the regulation and supervision of the Chicago Department of Buildings instead of FHFA, as Congress intended.
The ordinance requires mortgagees to pay a $500 registration fee for vacant properties and requires monthly inspections of mortgaged properties to determine if they are vacant. The ordinance also requires the Enterprises to pay the registration fees and to comply with these maintenance requirements even when the Enterprises have not foreclosed upon a property and therefore do not have ownership of the property. If the Enterprises fail to comply with the ordinance, the city may levy fines and penalties of up to $1,000 per day for noncompliance with any provision of the ordinance. Additionally, the ordinance sets forth detailed maintenance requirements which may be revised and amended by the Department of Buildings.
The lawsuit alleges that the city’s ordinance impermissibly encroaches upon FHFA’s role as the sole regulator and supervisor of the Enterprises. As Conservator of Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, FHFA has been charged with the responsibility of preserving and conserving the assets of the Enterprises. This lawsuit seeks to ensure that the city’s proposed registration and licensing system and “supervision” of the Enterprises by the Department of Buildings will not thwart Congress’s intent. Further, the registration fee represents a tax on the Enterprises and the Conservator that is expressly precluded by long-standing congressional directive.
Link to lawsuit
###
The Federal Housing Finance Agency regulates Fannie Mae, Freddie Mac and the 12 Federal Home Loan Banks. These government-sponsored enterprises provide more than $5.7 trillion in funding for the U.S. mortgage markets and financial institutions.
Congressman Barney Frank on Wednesday asked his colleagues to hold a hearing on alleged mortgage abuses at Ally Financial, a day after the attorney general from his home state of Massachusetts requested that lawmakers investigate.
“Given Ally’s significant role in the mortgage business and the federal government’s considerable financial investment,” Frank wrote to Spencer Bachus, the chairman of the House Financial Services Committee, “a prompt investigation of this matter by the Committee is warranted.”
The U.S. Treasury owns some 74 percent of Ally after a 2008 investment in the firm.
Last week Massachusetts sued Ally’s mortgage unit, GMAC Mortgage, and four other top banks for allegedly pursuing illegal foreclosures and deceiving homeowners whose loans they service.
Recent Comments