Matt Weidner – Fighting With The American People

Posts Tagged ‘jeffrey stephan’

An excellent article on the development of foreclosure defense and how it has developed nationwide.  My only comment is that it misses the most important piece of the puzzle….April Charney.  We all know that April has done more to help homeowners and advance this area of the law than any other lawyer or advocate in this country!

Wall Street Journal Here

Published: Tuesday, 19 Oct 2010

“SAN FRANCISCO – Consumer attorneys say there are fresh examples of documentation problems in U.S. home foreclosure cases, even as major banks resume legal proceedings against delinquent borrowers.

Bank of America and GMAC Mortgage, two of the largest servicers of U.S. residential loans, have spent a few weeks poring over their foreclosure procedures after allegations surfaced that for years banks have not reviewed documents properly or have submitted false statements to evict delinquent borrowers.

Consumer attorneys doubt the banks have cured the problems, noting that the speed of the announcement that foreclosure proceedings were to resume would have necessitated huge resources devoted to document review.

Bank of America announced on Monday a partial rollback in its foreclosure moratorium. GMAC, a unit of Ally Financial, has also resumed some foreclosure sales.

“How are they going to put out that kind of volume again?” said Christopher Immel, a Florida attorney who represents homeowners.

Bank of America conducted a scientific sampling of 102,000 foreclosures affected by the moratorium imposted earlier this month, said Dan Frahm, a spokesman for Bank of America Home Loans.

Frahm said he wasn’t aware of the sample size, but that it was large enough to have the confidence of the bank and its biggest investors.

“It would be incorrect to say we went through each and every one of them,” Frahm said.

GMAC would not disclose the manpower it used in its review, but spokeswoman Gina Proia said the company devoted “significant resources” to the issue. Across the country, the company is reviewing “each case going to foreclosure sale before it proceeds,” she said.

FLORIDA FORECLOSURE DENIED

But as recently as Friday, GMAC failed to secure a quick foreclosure on a Florida property where GMAC had been forced to withdraw, and then resubmit, a corrected affidavit, said Matthew Weidner, an attorney for the borrower.

To foreclose on a house, a lender must prove it has a valid claim. That means it must certify through an affidavit and other documentation that it clearly holds the right to enforce the terms of the loan, and that the borrower has actually defaulted.

According to Weidner, St. Petersburg-based Judge Walt Fullerton on Friday decided against a quick foreclosure on Carol Hasbrouck’s property, due to the uncertainty of having two sworn affidavits in the case file.

The withdrawn affidavit had been signed by GMAC employee Jeffrey Stephan, court filings show. Stephan helped spark the current controversy by testifying that he had signed some 10,000 documents a month.

The resubmitted affidavit still did not have any supporting documentation attached, which is required by Florida law, Weidner said.”

Click here to read the full story on CNBC…

The Jeffrey Stephan fiasco is just the beginning.  We are only becoming aware of the GREATEST FINANCIAL FRAUD EVER COMMITTED ON A SOCIETY because committed and dedicated attorneys stood up for their clients, remembered the oath they took when they became attorneys then they’ve continued working against impossible odds for years.  April Charney has long been on the forefront of this battle and she’s responsible for educating more attorneys in this state in this fight than any other.  Tom and Arianne Ice from Ice Legal have long produced the finest work and are training the best foreclosure fighters in this state.  There’s another superstar in this battle and while I don’t know him, his name is Thomas A. Cox from Maine.  Cox brought us one of the two important Jeffrey Stephan depositions, and now his case brings us…THE MOST IMPORTANT FORECLOSURE ORDER I’VE SEEN YET!

The fallout being reported across the country is just the beginning.  This site really is a blueprint for understanding this crisis and it includes some of the most important documents that judges, press, regulators and advocates need to understand the issues that will cause us all to suffer for decades.

THE BANKS DO NOT WANT YOU TO SEE THIS DOCUMENT

THE BANKS HAVE ASKED THE COURT TO SEAL THIS DOCUMENT.

THE ENTIRE MORTGAGE SERVICING INDUSTRY IS GOING TO GO BALLISTIC ONCE THIS ORDER GETS OUT THERE AND IS WIDELY DISTRIBUTED

THAT’S WHY IT’S SO IMPORTANT THAT YOU SIT DOWN AND READ THE DOCUMENT ATTACHED BELOW SLOWLY AND CAREFULLY……(AND SHARE IT WITH ALL YOUR FRIENDS)

StephanProtectiveOrder

Just a small sampling of the serious title issues that will be raised in years to come and will result in challenges to tens of thousands of foreclosure judgments across this county and which will expose the title insurance underwriters to an unimaginable volume of title claims….I can only imagine that federal intervention will be required….read on.

Perform Complete Title Search $15.95 + TPC

A title search is the very first step in performing a foreclosure.  If your title search is not done properly, no matter what happens later, you’re going to have problems….real problems.  I have been a title agent for years and I can tell you that there is no way on God’s green earth that I would go anywhere near performing a title search on even the smallest property without being paid an amount of money that would allow me to do the job correctly.  A proper examination of title, in the simplest and easiest case, would take anywhere from a half an hour to an hour.  Anything beyond the most basic title search would require quite literally hours of examination, hard work and study.

Cure Defective Mortgage $12.95 + TPC

“Defects” come in all different varieties…was the legal description incorrect?  Was the marital status or name incorrect?  Were pages not recorded or no recorded correctly?  Whatever the case, “curing” these errors takes time and can be very difficult.  There is just no way this reflects the real cost of doing this critical work and who actually has the right to correct a mortgage if the error was made by the original mortgagee years prior who is probably long gone out of business?  I very much question whether a subsequent mortgagee has the legal authority or right to correct errors made so long ago without Order of the court.

And now we get to the real damming elements from this list.  Take a careful look at each of the items on this list because these critical pieces of paper are where so many of the problems exist with the foreclosure cases that have been churned through over the last several years and it is these documents that will provide the fertile ground for challenging titles and judgments for years to come.  The list suggests that LPS is creating these documents….we also know that LPS or their employees were executing these documents.  The real question is whether those executing these documents had even the slightest authority or legal capacity to execute these key documents.  Any old person can sign documents all day long, but if the person signing the documents lacks the specific corporate authority or prerequisite legal basis to sign the documents, then they HAVE NO LEGAL FORCE OR EFFECT.

Understand that the documents listed below are the key and core documents that courts have relied upon to grant tens of thousands, perhaps hundreds of thousands of foreclosure judgments across the country.  We will be carefully examining these documents over the years to come.  The examination will focus on whether the person who signed these documents had any authority whatsoever to sign the documents.  Some questions.  If an originating lender has been in bankruptcy or has been a dissolved corporation since 2006/2007, how could LPS (or any other document mill) get documents signed on behalf of that defunct corporation?  Done properly, a federal bankruptcy trustee will authorize agents to sign on behalf of bankrupt corporations and supervise their actions, but how many bankruptcy trustees authorized the robo signers to sign for all these bankrupt  subprime lenders who make up the bulk of the mortgagees in these cases?

And here’s a good one…..under the Uniform Commercial Code, the technical legal requirement for an allonge is that it must be “so permanently affixed to a note so as to become a part of that document”…..earlier comments to to the Code made it clear that an allonge was only to be used when an endorsement could not be stamped on the note itself….but here is the billion dollar question…..

What business does LPS or any document mill have in producing allonges when those should only be in custody/control of the entity that is in possession of the original “wet ink” promissory note?

Create Lost Note Affidavit $12.95 + SH
Create Note Allonge $12.95 + SH

Create Missing Intervening Assignment $35.00 + TPC
Record Prepared Assignments $12.95 + TPC
Cure Defective Assignment $12.95 + TPC

LPS-DOCX Price List

Read carefully the Motion to Dismiss that I filed in one of my cases, drafted by a brilliant lawyer who works with me, Michael Fuino.  I submit that this memo was the first and most comprehensive document which addresses the issues surrounding Allonges.  Read the detailed legal history and research that we conducted.

allongemtd

(I also believe that Fuino’s memo and motions challenging affidavits was the first and most authoritative legal research on the affidavit issues that broke with Jeffrey Stephan, but that will be the subject of another post.)

The gig is up. The word is out.  The national press is on the scene.  Now they need real examples of the horrors of the foreclosure courtroom.  My problem is I have few horror stories to share.  Fortunately, the judges in the Sixth Judicial Circuit are pretty fair  and most of my clients get their cases resolved without the real horrors that I hear about from elsewhere.  The foreclosure mill attorneys don’t get too many cracks in on me or my clients…..WE DO THE KICKING AND PUNCHING IN MY CASES.

Having said that, I know this is all about to change.  I know there are going to be families who first find out their home is sold in foreclosure when the investor or sheriff comes knocking at the door.  I know there are families who have no notice of their hearings. I know there are families who lost there home to Jeffrey Stephan or other faulty affidavits.

Soon I will create a forum where everyone can come and share these stories, but for now, please email me directly at weidnerlaw@yahoo.com if you want to do it privately, or post your story here along with your contact information.

Thank You.

The foreclosure fiasco brewing up in the cauldrons of Florida’s courtrooms has many parties that can take the blame for catastrophic mess that will continue to unfold.  The lying, cheating, conning lenders and foreclosure mills are obviously the real wrongdoers here, but they could not pull this off on their own.  Our courts, court administrators and judges are next on the list for allowing this flawed and corrupted system to bubble and boil and spew out of control.  Rather than demand that the sloppy and sometimes outright fraudulent conduct stop, our courts have allowed it to perpetuate by failing to sanction the improper conduct that passes across the bench every day.  The legislature, rather than grasp the problem and give our courts the tools and resources to do the job just turned the heat up on this bubbling brew of badness and has demanded that this bad work be done faster.  Unfortunately, our courts have blindly and irresponsibly accepted that call.

The results of all this insanity are coming back to haunt us all much quicker than anyone could have expected…and it will only get worse.  Now that the press has taken hold of this issue, the snakes and demons just cannot be shoved back into Pandora’s Box.  This isn’t just blog talk…it’s national news and the front page of our excellent local and regional newspapers who really have caught the significance of all of this.

Read the Excellent Tampa Tribune Article Here