Matt Weidner – Fighting For The American People

Posts Tagged ‘Lender processing services’

From Forbes Magazine:

The AGs are seizing upon behavior which looks bad and may technically violate the law, but is hard to link directly to consumer injuries.

As with tobacco, the AGs are attacking a tragedy with many causes by going after the least popular actors in the drama. It’s good theater, but hard to see how beating up on the processing companies will prevent housing prices from finding their natural bottom. That will only occur when the economy recovers and a new wave of buyers bids on houses now occupied by people who can’t afford what they agreed to buy at the peak of the bubble.

http://www.forbes.com/sites/danielfisher/2012/02/07/mortgage-settlement-talks-look-like-tobacco-ii/

Hold onto something folks, an indictment by an Attorney General is a very big deal.  Now of course this indictment of a major player in fraudclosure and a major campaign contributor to Florida’s Attoney General is a really, really big deal.

Things are gonna get real testy at the attorney general parties with one ag all saddled up with the bad boys on one side of the room while the other attorney generals (those darn goody goody types) on the other side of the room pointing fingers at the guys they’ve indicted.

The really bizarre thing is these indictments are coming right at the same time the AG’s are supposed to be signing off on the terms of their sellout/blackmail/bribery with the banks.  So how in the world can any of them be talking settlement at all while at the same time they’re busy dropping 136 count indictments?

From The New York Times:

Chris Koster, the Missouri attorney general, will prosecute the case. “The grand jury indictment alleges that mass-produced fraudulent signatures on notarized real estate documents constitutes forgery,” Mr. Koster said in a statement. “Today’s indictment reflects our firm conviction that when you sign your name to a legal document, it matters.”

A sampling of the charges:

Defendant, acting knowingly in
concert with its employees, with the purpose to defraud, used as genuine or transferred
with the knowledge or belief that it would be used as genuine, a writing, namely Deed

Defendant
acting knowingly in concert with its employees, with the purpose to mislead the Boone
County Recorder of Deeds, a public servant in the performance of her duty, submitted
or invited reliance on a writing, namely Deed of Release number 2009010022, which
Defendant knew to be lacking in authenticity, and which stated a fact material to the
purposes for which the writing was offered.

DOCXIndictment

We all know Florida is developing some….ahhh, interesting “legal” theories.  One notable new legal concept from the Sunshine State is called,

“there’s no such thing as forgery, we call it “surrogate signing” down here”

(except that wait a minute isn’t that what AHMSI is suing LPS for?)

and then there’s this other one called,

“there’s no such thing as notary fraud down here we call it, “not illegal to violate the express terms of Florida’s Notary Law”

and then one of my favorites:

“banks can kick down doors whenever they damn well please, don’t worry with any court case, much less an Order”

If it all sounds rather scary and lawless and anarchy-like, well, you’re right.  It is indeed quite terrifying to live in a state where blatant White Collar Criminal Lawlessness has replaced hundreds of years worth of a state’s developed body of statutory and case law.  Where citizens and consumers lie helpless in the face of corporations and an entire system of government that is turned squarely against them, bought off and corrupted as it is by campaign cash.

Yes sir, if you want to see the very worst form of White Collar Criminal Oligarchy that bankster money can buy, well just turn your gaze down here to Florida and you’ll find a perfect case study….everywhere you turn.  And the world is indeed watching.  There are still a few people who give a damn.  A few strong and brave voices who dare to stand up and point out the insanity and danger in all of this.

I find it most regrettable and frankly terrifying that we live in a state where such lawlessness is the accepted state of affairs. I hope that our northern brothers and sisters, all fellow Americans, will not abandon all the good people who live down here and who suffer under this tyranny….take note of what some quite esteemed and authoritative sources say about the state of affairs:

Wow. So LPS used the whitewash IG report from Florida to justify the dismissal of their lawsuit in Nevada. And remember, LPS lobbyists more recently urged the Florida AG’s office to intervene on their behalf in a criminal case in Michigan. The connections between the FLorida AG’s office and LPS just continue to grow.

This also happens to be BS.

Firedoglake

I will withhold commentary about the various issues that are presented in the following documents and correspondence that are attached in the link below.  Okay, I cannot entirely resist, so here’s just one question…..

WHAT THE HELL IS A “SURROGATE” SIGNER?

If I notarize a signature by the person signing the signature is not the person, is that not just plain old forgery?  Is that not Notary Fraud?

Oh and just read this email:

We just received notification that the MI AG (Bill Schuette) announced the issuance of criminal subpoenas against LPS and DOCX. When I called, the assigned investigator hadn’t even heard of the AG meeting with LPS. I know that Michigan was already committed to be a non-site attendee. Could I talk to you about this issue generally? These public announcements can deeply impact LPS’s business operations and stock price and seem unnecessary if the AGs who issue them have already agreed to a meeting.

Really?  So the public finding out that you are the target of an Attorney General investigation has a negative impact on stock price?  And such disclosures are “unnecessary” because a meeting had been agreed to?  But what would come of such a meeting? And why should a proposed meeting have any  impact on an active investigation?

What is apparent, not just in the case of the firing of the Florida Attorneys who were investigating Fraudclosure, but also in the utter lack of any investigation of prosecution of any of the parties related to the nationwide scourge that is the foundation of the White Collar Criminal Oligarchy that runs this country, is that our elected officials can be bought and paid for both in writing laws and in the decisions not to prosecute or investigate wrongdoing.

Read the attached documents carefully.  Can you pick out the extraordinary issues that are presented?

 LENDER PROCESSING SERVICES

 and then read these emails:

Julian emails

Butler emails

At what point in time will the citizens of this country wake up and take notice of who their elected officials are actually working for?  This is why our country is becoming OCCUPIED……

For those of you that missed the first airing of the explosive program on Fraudclosuregate that ran on 60 Minutes a few months ago, it’s going to run again this Sunday.  The first airing attracted millions of viewers and advanced the cause by making the issues known by millions of people.

But despite all this exposure, in many ways things are still the same.  Or worse.  Now the problems are front and center and it can no longer be denied, ignored or minimized.  The fact that fraudclosures go on unchecked is a terrifying commentary on the state of affairs in our country.

FROM LYNN:

I approach the reairing this Sunday of the foreclosure fraud episode on 60 Minutes  with mixed feelings.

Before the initial showing, I would have asked “How can we get judges, prosecutors and legislators to watch this?”

Now, I am asking, “How can we get judges, prosecutors and legislators to care about this?”  Judges have watched the episode and have said “I don’t care that the notary wrote her name upside-down.”  Others said, “I can’t let a TV show into evidence.”

I was floored by this.  Why would so many people be so determined to trivialize these crimes by banks?

I was contacted by several thousand people after the show – many were losing their court  cases to documents “signed” by Linda Green.  Lender Processing Services refused to step forward and disclose to courts that these documents were fraudulent; the mortgage servicing companies continued to press as many foreclosures as possible using these documents or similarly forged and fraudulent documents.

By far the most disturbing development was the firing of the two Florida Assistant Attorney Generals, June Clarkson and Theresa Edwards, who were leading the investigation of LPS.  One of the reasons was that they had been too aggressive with the lawyers representing LPS.  Then one of the highest ranking members of the Attorney General’s office joined LPS as a Senior VP of government affairs.  Then the press began reporting about campaign contributions made by LPS and LPS officers to the Florida Attorney General.

No matter how egregious and well-documented the wrongs, there are no consequences for the banks.

By far, my overwhelming feeling four months later is anger – mixed with renewed determination to speak the truth.  I am very disturbed by the power of banks.  Before I was somewhat aware that banks had gained tremendous power and influence.  Now, I am aware almost every moment of every day that money controls our politics and banks control our money.

The most encouraging development has been the reaction of county recorders.  I flew to North Carolina to meet Guilford County Recorder Jeff Thigpen.  Jeff is not the sort of individual who watches TV and says, “Someone should do something about that.”  Jeff and his co-workers really went to work immediately  and have been working ever since to expose the corruption of our land records nationwide.  In Massachusetts, John O’Brien
even commissioned a study and has spoken out about the massive problem caused by MERS and corrupt mortgage servicers.  In Michigan, it was Curtis Hertel, Jr. who dared to speak the truth.

In Florida, almost nothing has changed.  The state attorney and the clerk of the court here have NOT accepted my request to meet with them.  The Florida Attorney General’s office may be hard at work investigating my complaints, but if so they sure have not contacted me.  Once June & Theresa were removed, all communication ceased.

Deutsche Bank and its lawyers have become much more aggressive in my own case, even adding my son as a defendant (though we were able to get that dismissed).

If the extent of this fraud is ever exposed and addressed, it will be because people like these country recorders and bulldog legislators like Elijah Cummings of Maryland were not intimidated by the banks and their service companies.

My regret is that I may have held out false hope to many desperate people.

If journalists had not told this story – and the truth about crimes by banks – then the banks’ version of history would prevail: “Millions of Americans woke up one morning and decided to be irresponsible deadbeats. More, faster foreclosures will save the economy.”

I admire the hell out of you and 60 Minutes for running this story.  I sure did expect more courage from prosecutors and legislators – but I am finally, at age 62, cured of my naivete.

I look forward to the story about the banks being brought to justice.

Best Regards,

Lynn Szymoniak

http://www.cbsnews.com/video/watch/?id=7361572n

We are all getting screwed, sold up the river by the Attorneys General who have crafted a settlement agreement with the criminal corporations that are abusing our country and courts.  That we are all being abused is now universally understood and is being consistently reported on. You can’t get more coverage than the New York Times after all.  So what will come of the outrage that’s being squarely reported on?  Probably nothing.  But the reporting will be advance warning to all of us that things will get worse and that the corporations own us all….

From the New York Times:

We were worried recently when we saw an advance draft of legal agreements between federal regulators and the nation’s big banks to address and correct foreclosure abuses. The actual deals were as bad as we feared.

Full Editorial Here

And more analysis in a front page article that appeared in the New York Times:

Gretchen Article