The Consumer Protection Law Committee presents

Significant Changes in

Consumer Protection Law

Thursday, June 21, 2012

2:00 p.m. to 5:00 p.m.

Room: Sanibel 1-3 – Gaylord Palm Hotel, Orlando, FL

Maximum credit 3.5 hours CLER/2 Certification

3.5 hours general CLER; 2 hours Business Litigation; 1 Real Estate

Course No. 84791

The last year brought sweeping changes for companies and consumers in a multitude

of laws and regulations. This seminar will give attendees important information about

current trends and changes in consumer protection laws and how they could affect their

practices. The program will review:

• New regulations and other statutory dictates under the Dodd-Frank Act and the

creation of the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau

• New and emerging issues in Florida’s Deceptive and Unfair Trade Practices Act

• New and emerging issues in the foreclosure crisis

• Changes to the Bankruptcy Code

Issues will be covered from both the national and the Florida-specific perspective.

Consumer Protection Law Committee members will engage with national and state

level expert guests over the panoply of issues that affect consumers and the attorneys

involved in consumer litigation.

Among the special guests are:

• Deepak Gupta, senior counsel for enforcement strategy at the Consumer Financial

Protection Bureau

• Former Mississippi Supreme Court Justice Oliver E. Diaz, who served as an

inspiration for John Grisham’s novel “The Appeal”

• Florida Sen. Mike Fasano, R-New Port Richey

The format for “Significant Changes in Consumer Protection Law” is:

Overview of program and review of materials by CPLC

member Janet Varnell 15 minutes

Presentation by Deepak Gupta, with introduction by CPLC

member Victoria Butler, Florida Attorney General’s Office 45 minutes

5 Minute Break

Panel discussion on the changes in foreclosure, bankruptcy,

arbitration and the Florida Deceptive and Unfair Trade Practice

Act by CPLC members Lynn Drysdale, Margery Golant

and John Yanchunis

45 minutes

Panel will add Sen. Mike Fasano to discuss bills filed in the

recent legislative session relating to potential changes to

the foreclosure process and how to effectively track and

influence legislation

30 minutes

5 Minute Break

Panel headed by former Mississippi State Supreme Court

Justice Oliver E. Diaz about the changing nature of corporate

influence on the judicial process

35 minutes

Bios of the speakers:

OLIVER E. DIAZ JR. is a former presiding justice on the Mississippi

Supreme Court. He was appointed to the court in 2000 and defeated in

the 2008 election. During his tenure as a judge, Diaz was indicted and

cleared of federal bribery and tax evasion charges. His tribulations were

fictionalized in John Grisham’s book, “The Appeal” – which recounted a

Gulf Coast attorney being politically targeted – and are included in the

documentary film “Hot Coffee,” first screened at the Sundance Film Festival

and then aired on HBO in 2011. The film’s website notes: “When big

business interests couldn’t beat Justice Oliver Diaz in his re-election to

the Mississippi Supreme Court, despite millions of dollars spent on advertising,

they found a way to have him criminally prosecuted on false charges, tainting his reputation

and causing political hardship for years to come.”

A September 2007 article in Harper’s Magazine reported: “After reviewing the Diaz case . . . it is

clear that no independent prosecutor would ever have brought these charges, that the prosecution

was . . . driven by political appointees in Washington working together with Diaz’s political

opponents in Mississippi, and that the prosecutions served a manifestly partisan, and inherently

corrupt, political agenda.”

Currently Diaz has a law practice in Jackson, Miss., focusing on personal injury, white collar

criminal defense, appellate litigation and consulting and lobbying.

Diaz served in the Mississippi House of Representatives (representing Biloxi and D’Iberville) from

1988 to 1994. He was a subcommittee chairman for the Insurance Committee and for the Judiciary

Committee. He was on the Ways and Means Committee and was secretary for the Constitution

Committee.

He also served as city attorney for the City of D’Iberville for four years. Diaz was elected to the

Mississippi Court of Appeals in November 1994 and served in that position until March 2000, at

which time he was appointed to the Mississippi Supreme Court. In 2000, he was elected to the

Supreme Court for an eight-year term.

Diaz received a Bachelor of Arts degree from the University of South Alabama in 1982 and his

J.D. from the University of Mississippi School of Law in 1985.

The Consumer Protection Law Committee presents

MIKE FASANO is a Republican member of the Florida Senate, representing

the 11th District since 2003. Previously he was a member of the Florida

House of Representatives from 1994 through 2002. Within the House,

he was a majority whip from 1996 to 1998, the majority floor leader from

1998 to 2000 and the House Majority Leader from 2000 to 2001.

Sen. Fasano was first elected to the Florida Senate in November 2002

and consequently re-elected in 2004 and 2008. From 2008 through 2010,

he served as president pro tempore of the Florida Senate.

He represents Senate District 11, which encompasses western parts of

Citrus, Hernando and Pasco counties and northern Pinellas County. Fasano

served as majority whip under the leadership of Senate Majority Leader Dan Webster.

His other Senate committee memberships have included: Communications and Public Utilities;

Fiscal Policy and Calendar; Health Regulation; Judiciary; Regulated Industries; Rules; and the

Joint Legislative Budget Commission. For several years, Sen. Fasano chaired the Transportation

and Economic Development Appropriations Committee, where he oversaw a budget of approximately

$12 billion.

Fasano is associate vice president for investments, Morgan Stanley; and director of Community

and Legal Affairs at Florida Hospital in Zephyrhills.

Born in Long Island, NY, Fasano and his family moved to Florida in 1971.

DEEPAK GUPTA is senior counsel for Enforcement Strategy at the Consumer

Financial Protection Bureau, a new federal agency. He is also

an adjunct professor of law at the law schools of both Georgetown and

American universities. From 2004 to 2011, Gupta was an attorney at

Public Citizen Litigation Group, where his practice encompassed consumer

protection, constitutional law and Supreme Court and appellate

litigation. Gupta has briefed and argued cases on a wide range of issues

before the U.S. Supreme Court, federal appellate and district courts nationwide,

and the state supreme courts of Alaska, Arkansas, Connecticut,

Maryland, Michigan, New Jersey and Ohio. Most recently, Gupta argued

before the U.S. Supreme Court in AT&T Mobility v. Concepcion (2011),

a landmark case concerning whether corporations may use arbitration clauses in consumer and

employment contracts to ban class actions. He also served as counsel in two other major arbitration

cases in the Supreme Court, Rent-A-Center v. Jackson (2010) and Stolt-Nielsen v. Animalfeeds

(2010).

At Public Citizen, Gupta founded and directed the organization’s Consumer Justice Project, which

collaborated with advocates nationwide on cases with the potential to broadly affect consumers’

rights. Before that, he served as the Alan Morrison Supreme Court Project Fellow, coordinating

assistance to litigants in public interest cases before the U.S. Supreme Court.

In addition to his litigation work, Gupta has engaged in legislative and policy advocacy on consumer

issues, appeared on TV and radio programs (including ABC’s “World News” and “Good

Morning America” CNN’s “Lou Dobbs Tonight,” NPR’s “Morning Edition” and “All Things Considered,”

and FOX News), and has been quoted by publications including the New York Times,

Washington Post, Los Angeles Times, Wall Street Journal and USA Today. Gupta frequently

speaks at national legal conferences and law schools and is the co-founder (along with Professor

Jeff Sovern) of the Consumer Law and Policy Blog.

Consumer Protection Law Committee members:

VICTORIA BUTLER, immediate past chair of the Consumer Protection Law Committee, has

practiced consumer protection law for more than 13 years with the Office of the Florida Attorney

General. She is bureau chief in the Tampa office of the Economic Crimes Division. Before her

employment with the Attorney General’s Office, Butler was a federal district court law clerk and

deputy court counsel to the state circuit court.

LYNN DRYSDALE, chair of the Consumer Protection Law Committee, is a consumer protection

attorney who has been with Jacksonville Area Legal Aid, Inc. for more than 20 years. Drysdale is

co-chair of the Board of the National Association of Consumer Advocates and has been a contributing

writer for the National Consumer Law Center practice manuals. She has twice been a presenter

at Federal Trade Commission Workshops in Washington, D.C., relating to debt collection

and has testified before the Senate Banking, Housing and Urban Development Committee twice

relating to lending practices affecting military service members and their families. She has also

testified before the Federal Reserve Board regarding the Home Ownership Equity Protection Act.

Drysdale represents consumers in individual and class action cases and engages in legislative

advocacy relating to debt collection, pay day loans, spot delivery motor vehicle sales, military

pension loans and other consumer issues. She teaches foreclosure defense litigation around the

state and is an adjunct consumer law professor at the University of Florida, Levin College of Law,

of which she is a graduate.

MARGERY E. GOLANT, co-chair of the Consumer Protection Law Committee, practices with Golant

& Golant, P.A., in Boca Raton. She is a real estate attorney and litigator with more than 20

years of experience. She represents consumers in financial services litigation in defense of foreclosure

and focuses on issues of securitization and structured finance issues. Golant previously

worked at one of the largest subprime mortgage servicers in the United States and was a district

court judge in Pennsylvania.

JANET VARNELL, co-chair of the Consumer Protection Law Committee, is a partner at Varnell

& Warwick, P.A., in The Villages. She represents consumers and businesses in class actions and

other complex litigation against some of the largest titans of industry throughout the country.

Varnell is a frequent speaker for a host of organizations on consumer law topics. She serves on

the board of Public Justice, the nation’s preeminent public interest law firm, and is the former

co-chair of the National Association of Consumer Advocates.

JOHN A. YANCHUNIS, of Morgan and Morgan in Tampa, restricts his practice to consumer and

class action litigation. Yanchunis has received an “AV” rating from Martindale Hubbell. He holds

a Bachelor of Arts undergraduate degree from the University of Florida. He graduated in 1980

from South Texas College of Law with his J.D. degree, magna cum laude. He is a member of

The Florida Bar and The Texas Bar. Yanchunis has been a member of Board of Governors of The

Florida Bar, and a member of the boards of The Florida Board of Bar Examiners and The Florida

Bar Foundation.

JAMES YOUNG is special counsel to the Florida Attorney General, advising the administration on

matters of national scope ranging from civil rights to complex multi-state litigation. He formerly

served as the Economic Crimes bureau chief for the Attorney General’s Jacksonville office. Young

received his law degree from Nova Southeastern University in 1997. Before joining the AG’s office,

he spent four years as associate corporate counsel and director of Global Risk Management

for the GEO Group (Wackenhut Corrections) in Palm Beach Gardens.

It’s too early on a Sunday to get all worked up, but the quote is just amazing….

MITTENS SPEAKS

At what point in time will this nation wake up and begin to quantify the real toll this madness being wrought upon us by the banks and Wall Street is causing?

And what would happen if the banks got their way and threw all the Americans they were suing out into the street?

How much blood would be on the streets of America if that really happened?

Just picture the world as explicitly advocated by the banks.  First, they are permitted to kick down the doors of any home they have a mortgage on under the guise of “property preservation” or “inspection”.  If law enforcement is called, the bank simply sends law enforcement away, asserting that it’s a private matter….they can kick down doors and enter property any time they please anywhere they please and no intervention of law enforcement is warranted.

And they can use whatever fraud or forgery or lies and tricks they care to in order to complete foreclosure….after all, the deadbeat homeowner has not paid a mortgage.

But fundamentally, think about the madness of throwing all these people out into the street.  Now mind you, the properties that are being set up for auction are not being sold to true third parties, the banks are taking them back, sitting on them, letting them sit vacant.  Or worse, as we are finding out more and more, deals are being cut where properties post-foreclosure are being given to insiders and other shady deals.

But again, just ignore all that….picture the world the banks want…..

MILLIONS OF AMERICAN FAMILIES THROWN OUT INTO THE STREETS

And think about that as you read this story…

READ THIS MOST DISTURBING STORY HERE

Hat tip to Nye Lavalle and Jackie Mack!

In my mind, JPMorgan ranks among the very top of the most aggressive and abusive litigators in the whole fraudclosure arena.  They surround themselves with monster paid lawyers then attack the whistleblowers and those who dare to challenge with the ferocity of an out of control criminal street gang.

And so I love seeing them get a few shots thrown back their direction.

Understand, the position we are in around this nation is the banks do whatever they want. They engage in whatever abusive and violent and bullying conduct they care to, then they just cloak themselves behind the highest priced lawyers and navigate their way through whatever court system they need to in order to walk away with no consequence.

In this case and so many others, you see them slithering and bashing and beating a homeowner in a federal case.  I’ve read pleadings after pleadings and the legal position they assert is,

SCREW YOU AMERICAN TAXPAYER, WE OWN THESE LAWS, WE DO WHAT WE WANT

(and then just as a kicker they throw in)

AND WE’RE COMING AFTER THE CONSUMER LAWYERS WHO DARED TO CHALLENGE US

But one judge dared to keep the scales of justice balanced equally, a quite extraordinary fact, frankly. Read the opinion:

Defendants, JP Morgan Chase & Co., a foreign corporation, JPMorgan Chase
Bank, N.A., individually and as successor to (collectively “Chase”), Washington Mutual
Bank, a dissolved federal bank (“WaMu”), and Federal National Mortgage Corporation, a
federally-chartered corporation (“FNMA”), (collectively, the “Defendants”), pursuant to
Rule 12(b)(6), Federal Rule of Civil Procedure, move to dismiss Plaintiff’s First
Amended Complaint. Defendants seek dismissal on grounds that (1) Plaintiff waived her
claims by failing to assert them in a 2006 mortgage foreclosure case; (2) Plaintiff fails to
state any causes of action in the various counts of the First Amended Complaint inasmuch
as she fails to differentiate among Defendants in her allegations; (3) Count I fails to state
a cause of action because the Florida Deceptive and Unfair Trade Practices Act
(“FDUTPA”), section 501.201, et seq., Florida Statutes, does not apply to Defendants; (4)
Count II fails to state a cause of action because Defendants are not debt collectors as
defined by the Fair Debt Collection Practices Act (“FDCPA”) and initiating a mortgage
foreclosure action does not constitute a debt collection; (5) Plaintiff fails to state a claim
under the Florida Consumer Collection Practices Act (“FCCPA”), section 559.72, Florida
Statutes, in Count II; (6) Plaintiff fails to state a cause of action for civil conspiracy in
Count III; (7) Plaintiff failed to state a cause of action for abuse of legal process in Count
IV; and (8) Count V, alleging violations of the RICO statute,18 U.S.C. § 1962, fails to
state a cause of action.

With respect to the asserted waiver of Plaintiff’s claims for her failure to assert
them in the 2006 foreclosure case, the Court is not convinced, at this stage of the
proceedings, that Plaintiff waived her claims because the complaint includes allegations
based on conduct that occurred after her alleged breach of the mortgage loan agreement.
She asserts that the facts supporting her claims were not brought to light until revelations
of fraud in the mortgage industry began to unfold in the fall of 2010. Additionally, the
Court cannot base a dismissal on matters outside the four corners of the complaint. See
Milburn v. United States, 734 F.2d 762, 765 (11th Cir. 1984). While JPMC claims it is
not liable for any conduct of WaMu that occurred prior to September 25, 2008, the date
on which the Purchase and Assumption Agreement (“PAA”) was executed between
JPMC and WaMu, the PAA has not even been filed with the Court. Furthermore,
Plaintiff asserts that her claims against Defendant JPMC are predicated on its alleged
servicing of the loan, conduct that occurred after September 25, 2008.
Defendants claim exemption from FDUTPA as banking corporations regulated by
a federal agency; however, application of the exemption cannot be determined with
certainty from the four corners of the First Amended Complaint. The Court is not
convinced that the exemption would apply to Defendants who, as Plaintiff alleges, acted
as loan servicers, and the exemption clearly would not apply to non-banks such as
JPMCC and FNMA. Also, although Defendants assert that they are not “debt collectors”
within the meaning of the FDCPA because they were not attempting to collect a debt due
another, there remains a question of fact as to whether 15 U.S.C. § 1692(f) applies to
activities by JPMCC, JPMC, WaMu, and FNMA, as alleged by Plaintiff, to enforce a
security interest via mortgage foreclosure. See 15 U.S.C. § 1692a(6).
Questions of fact preclude dismissal of Plaintiff’s FCCPA claim as well, because
she plainly alleges that Defendants knew they did not have the legal right to collect the
alleged debt and knew that Plaintiff was not in default. See Fla. Stat § 559.72(9).
Likewise, Plaintiff is able to overcome dismissal of her common law claims for civil
conspiracy and abuse of process through her factual allegations that Defendants acted
unlawfully, and in agreement, with the intent to defraud her through the use of sham
documents and fabricated evidence, and that their actions caused her damages. Finally,
her civil RICO claims under 18 U.S.C. § 1962 adequately allege facts, at least for this
stage of the proceedings, to support each of the statutory elements for the predicate acts
that allegedly divested her of her homestead. Plaintiff is able to avoid the time-bar of her
civil RICO claim inasmuch as she alleges she was prevented from discovering that she
was the victim of fraud by Defendants’ concealment of the alleged fraud.

JACKIEmACK

They say a picture is worth a thousand words.  Well, maybe pictures will succeed where millions of words have failed.  Foreclosure defense attorneys and human beings who are suffering have poured their words out in pleadings filed with the courts all across this country, but the courts have ignored their words.  A defendant’s words are ignored and they are thrown into the street.  Families and children and senior citizens thrown into the street while the very same homes they’re thrown out of sit vacant, abandoned, abused, vandalized, made dangerous.

The banks have likewise poured their words out as well.

Fraudulent words, forged words, untrue words.  Printed and signed and sworn to and notarized under PENALTIES OF PERJURY on Assignments and Affidavits and legal pleadings and sworn statements filed in courtrooms all across this country. But their evil words, their lies, their desecrations of a once just legal system are accepted and consecrated by this legal system that has turned its back on the people it was created to protect.

Which of course begs the question,

“Are there in fact any PENALTIES OF PERJURY in this lawless nation any longer?”

Not from where I sit.  Jamie Dimon still flies high and free and proud. Blankfeld too. And John Corzine, they all sit high and mighty and live quite well, thank you very much.

But there are in fact profound and devastating consequences for all their lies and their conduct down here at the ground level, on the front lines of this war.  I see it in the faces of my clients and in the faces and the eyes of all those hapless and hopeless people who sit in courtroom benches waiting for what passes as “justice” in this evil age.

I stared back at these faces the other morning as one of Florida’s Foreclosure Rocket Dockets initiated and was ready to take off again the other morning.  Hundreds of families thrown out into the street, the judge sitting in his black robe while a foreclosure mill worked in perfect synchrony to throw these families, these human pieces of detritus into the judicial wood chipper.

Bank Lawyer: Foreclosure

Judge: 120 Sale Date

Homeowner: Um, Ok Judge if you say so.

No evidence. No review. No consideration of forged assignments or forged notes or no evidence or anything for that matter. Not a single thought that maybe, just maybe our nation’s legal system had some scintilla of an obligation to police, some duty to protect this unwashed sea of humanity from the tyranny that is wrought upon this land.  Just human beings thrown to the wolves, thrown out into the streets. Every unchecked judgment a victory for the banks, every judgment a human carcass thrown onto the inferno of injustice that rages across this nation.

My heart sunk when I watched the Florida Supreme Court’s Pino v. Bank of NY arguments.  I know these justices have not seen what we see every day.  Oh how I wish they would strip away the robes, those glorious robes and wear the uniform of today’s American.  What an experience it would be for one justice, two justice, three justice, four to travel the state anonymously playing the role of one of those they swore an oath to protect and defend.  Oh what an experiment in real liberty and justice if they came dressed in dirty denim to see how the court system they control now functions.  What would they think as Sheriffs barred their entry into supposedly open courtrooms?  Would they perceive courtrooms are fair and equitable when the banks are camped out, set up, comfortable and organized, streamlined, their papers pre-prepared, handed to the judge while they take the judge’s stamp and KERCHUNK, KERCHUNK, KERCHUNK, stamp out orders.  What would they think of foreclosure “trials” where no evidence is presented at all, only papers, prepared by the banks, then blessed by the judge.  Kiss the ring.  How can “our” justices judge if they have not had this experience?  How can the perception and perspective be balanced if their connection to our state’s legal system is predominated by thousand dollar fundraisers sponsored by the nation’s banking elite?

It cannot.

But again, these words fail.

Perhaps these pictures might capture the story better. (here)