“Wizard Behind the Curtain” and “Robo Signer” (copyright Matt Weidner, ha ha)
My friend Stopa did a post tonight on a phenomena we’ve been kicking around for several months now…it’s the fact that Americans are being sued by zombies…entities that have no clear legal basis to exercise one of the most powerful forces in the entire world….THE JURISDICTION OF THE US COURT SYSTEM.
Our courts are throwing people out into the streets based on the whispers and accusations of zombies….
Well, let Mark tell you more:
THANKS TO STOPA AND JON COATS AND ROCK LAW AND TICTIN FOR SPONSORING FLORIDA’S MORTGAGE JUSTICE GROUP!
There is a law firm out of the Milwaukee, Wisconsin area which has used its own attorneys as MERS signers, has filed the foreclosure actions and then has refused to provide discovery on the issue of the validity of the loan assignment (note and mortgage) claiming attorney-client privilege. The mortgage assignments purport to “assign” the note. The mortgage follows the note, not the other way around.
There is another law firm out of the Milwaukee, Wisconsin area which created the assignments of mortgages out of MERS in order to support bringing actions in the name of the servicers and now the “trustees.”
Both of these law firms have been Fannie Mae approved counsel. Within days of my conversation with a Federal Home Finance Authority attorney, Fannie Mae posted an item that it was no longer “approving” counsel.
In the meantime, as of July 22, 2011, MERS created “Rule 8” (available on the MERS website in its Rules of Membership) which is the most interesting admission to date. It says that MERS requires the note OWNER to assign the mortgage out of MERS. MERS never had the notes and all of the paperwork we see in Wisconsin right now are notes endorsed in blank under the claim that the mortgage assignee is the holder of the note, not the owner, or there is no endorsement at all. Raise the issue of no endorsement or have an attorney appear who knows that the note has to be endorsed and suddenly a rubber stamp endorsing the note in blank will appear.
We have fraudulent documents, created by the attorneys appearing in the foreclosure cases, making assignments of mortgages from MERS to the foreclosing entity. We are beyond having the servicers try to foreclose in their names up here now. They are now claiming that the trustees of the securitization trusts are foreclosing (unless it is Fannie or Freddie) but I have yet to see the loan documents which show any transfer to the securitization trusts. MERS Rule 8 requires the note OWNER to assign the mortgage out of MERS. The holder of the note is not the same as the owner of the note.
MERS never had the notes to begin with, so when they hastily put Rule 8 together, they assumed that note OWNER could be proven. The expect work-around? More robo-signing by law firms and document mills to create the appearance that the trust owns the note? Many thanks to Abigail Field for her February 2, 2012 article on securitization fail and to Matt Weidner for posting the article on his blog. https://abigailcfield.com/?p=882 This article explains robo-signing far better than the MERS “front” (per Beau Biden’s Delaware consumer fraud complaint) alone.
Perhaps in the enforcement of the AG settlement, we can claim that the agents (attorneys) for the 5 banks involved are violating the servicing standards by their actions going forward. If only we could see the actual language of the settlement instead of press releases. People have hearings scheduled and need the settlement language, if the settlement has been signed. Why is it being withheld? Because it can be used as admissions against interest by the 5 banks? I doubt that. The federal consent decrees of April, 2011 all had language to the effect that the banks were not admitting liability. Why, then, is the language of the settlement not being released?
What modification???
Franklin Dee Williams
Thanks for the sensible critique. Me and my friend were just preparing to do a little research on this. We got a book from our area library but I think I learned more from this post. I am very glad to see such great info being shared freely out there.