THIS NEEDS TO GO VIRAL

PLEASE HELP TO PASS THIS FORWARD IT NEEDS TO GO VIRAL.


May-04-2013 11:13

Sheriff's Department Takes Family's Home and Contents Using a Fake Eviction

Tim King Salem-News.com

Theodore Visner and Kathy Smith are having trouble getting their story out...

Visner-Smith family

(MT. PLEASANT, MI) - U.S. Navy veteran Ted Visner and his wife, Kathy Smith of Mt. Pleasant, Michigan, have been living out a nightmare. It started two and a half years ago, when the family fell victim to an apparent real estate scam by a local sheriff's department employee.

The Mt. Pleasant, Michigan home.

Ted Visner says they bought their former home on a land contract, only to learn seven months later, that the seller, Isabella County Sheriff's Dept. employee Shelly Sweet, was not making monthly payments on the house. A bank foreclosed on the property, all unbeknownst to the Visner/Smith family.

Ted Visner, who builds custom homes for a living, said, "Although we were paying Sweet every month on the purchase of the property, she had not been paying the underlying mortgage and the home fell into foreclosure." I asked Visner if he had records of those payments, he said he does, including canceled checks. You won't believe what happened next.

"On a weekend Sweet knew that we would be out of town, she offered the contents of our home to her friends and coworkers at the Isabella County Sheriff’s Department, claiming we had abandoned the home. Many took her up on her free offer deal and took over $55,000 dollars worth of our personal property."

Property Vanishes

$55,000 is a big number, but Visner said Sweet availed all of their personal belongings and private property to anyone who would take it. Visner tells Salem-News the items taken included beds, dressers, appliances, his wife's wedding dress which was hermetically sealed, kids toys, sports equipment, and a whole lot more.

Visner served his country for 6 years, aboard U.S. Navy submarines.

"My kids couldn't play or participate in sports for the next two years. Other items that disappeared included tax records... nothing has been recovered."

The story seems blatantly criminal in nature, with police banding together to help off their property in its entirety. Visner said, "She just put a sign out and let anybody have what they wanted, she didn't remember who was there. In her own deposition she admits to giving our stuff away."

Visner says Sweet told her employer, the sheriff's department that Visner and his wife weren't making payments, while Visner is able to prove via canceled checks to Sweet that they were indeed paying. "It was blatantly untrue," Visner added. "There is no evidence to support what the county did, it all shows what we are saying though."

He says the experience has been extremely hard for his family, adding, "I don't have any criminal background, I served six years in the Navy on submarines, my wife and I have kids, we don't deserve this, nobody in the world deserves this."

Visner, Smith and their kids, returned from their weekend away on Monday September 27, 2010, to discover that they were locked out of their own home. Visner called the law enforcement agency that Sweet worked for.

"We had NOT been evicted nor had we abandoned the property. The woman had convinced friends and coworkers that we had never paid her, and that were trashing the house and had forced her into foreclosure -- none of which were true."

Photos of Ted Visner's custom homes: vizbuilt.com

It would take a day before the family was allowed to go back inside of the home, and that is when Smith and Visner learned that 95% of the home's contents had been stolen.

"A sheriff deputy named 'Steinert' came to our home three times that day and only assisted his coworker while the under-sheriff, sheriff and PA refused to help us after they recognized the totality of the situation," Visner said, adding that the "situation" was 6+ coworkers of Sweet having entered their home and receiving stolen property, which for anyone else in the world is Theft.

Instead, Visner was arrested for "Misuse of 911" on the deputy's third visit. "The county investigated the crime for almost four months and during this time, I moved my family out of Isabella County for safety, I could not move with them because my indefinitely delayed arraignment still loomed over my head."

Visner says after losing the home he shared with his family, and 95% of their belongings to the sheriff's department, that the prosecutor's office ignored their complaints and still refused to investigate "their employees". In his words, "Over two and a half years have passed now with law enforcement officials doing nothing except covering for one another."

Visner says the underlying crime was the conspiracy to deprive his family’s constitutional rights - that is a federal crime during the commission of which, he asserts that he was kidnapped (arrested) by Deputy Steinert on the "bullshit charge" of misusing 911. Violation of Title 18 U.S.C. §§ 241 and 242 is a federal felony crime where the offenders could be sentenced to death if killing or kidnapping occur.

Family photographs provided by Ted Visner

Visner says the following people participated in the crimes against his family.

Isabella County Sheriff Deputy Clinton Steinert
Isabella County Sheriff Department Clerk Shelly Sweet
Isabella County under-sheriff John Tellis
Isabella County Sheriff Leo Mioduszewski
Isabella County Board of Commissioners (7 or 8)
Isabella County Prosecuting Attorney Larry Burdick (out-going)
Isabella County Prosecuting Attorney Risa Scully (incoming)

"Our story needs to go viral, people need to know that they have to stand up for their rights, when we stop standing for our rights we won't have them anymore." He concluded that statement by adding that you only have rights when people in positions of authority listen.

"The Attorney General is dismissing this serious crime... For my family and I, there is no recourse, at least not yet. The AG prohibits complaints of police misconduct and civil rights being violated. I just wrote a letter to the ACLU and explained this, I haven't heard back from them yet," Visner said.

Salem-News attempted to reach Isabella County Sheriff Leo Mioduszewski, he has not returned our call in regard to the Visner case. An employee of the sheriff's office told Salem-News that the agency does not have a public information officer.

Is it possible to receive an "F minus" as a public safety agency? If so, based on the above information, that is definitely the grade the Isabella County Sheriff's Dept. in Michigan deserves. You can draw your own conclusions, but these cops appear to take law enforcement corruption and government misuse of power to all new levels.

A small donation will go a very long way for this family as they continue to put their lives back together! The family would like to offer you their sincere appreciation for your contribution!

Learn more, visit: Visner4Sheriff.com, or call Ted Visner at 989-954-2814.

Bank Record Earnings Are from Theft From Investors and Homeowners

Bank Record Earnings Are from Theft From Investors and Homeowners

by Neil Garfield

Sitting in my living room I notice the little trailer at the bottom of the screen. The earnings are from trading profits, they say -- which is exactly what I told you they would say when they brought back the money in installments that they had already stolen from investors and are still in the process of stealing from hapless homeowners.

It still seems too crazy to be true and the Banks are banking on the idea that people will reject the notion that these trading profits are fictitious just like the mortgage bonds and loan documents. And the same as the Foreclosures that are also legally indefensible but proceeding anyway because it seems "obvious" that if you don't pay your loan you are in default. And if some bank, say U.S. Bank as trustee relating to certificates XYZ - 2006b2 comes along and says you know you didn't pay, you know you have defaulted, and since we are the new creditor you lose your home --- that is what you signed up for.

It never occurs to the homeowner that in the shrouded corridors of Wall Street his loan is not in default. How could that be true when he stopped paying? It never occurs to the homeowner that the whole thing was a sham. It never occurs to him because he asks himself what difference does it make who owns the loan, I didn't pay so I'm out. And so 96% of homeowners didn't skip a beat as they left their keys on the counter after cleaning up so nobody would think they were slobs, just deadbeats.

I said in 2007 and I say it again, that virtually all loans, whether the alleged borrower was paying or not, we're paid off from the very beginning. I say again there can be no default on a debt that isn't due regardless of how it came to be "not due." And I say again that Wall Street was stealing investors money from the beginning through the middle and at the end --- and that the borrowers were a smoke screen for the theft. The Banks got paid on loans they never made. They got insurance on defaults that never occurred. They got credit default swap money on declarations from the banks that they were losing money on deals they never invested any money whatsoever.

They got paid 300 cents on the dollar, minimum. If you collect from the borrower too you get 400 cents on the dollar. The dollar is the dollar of investors not even 1 cent from the banks. Their return is infinite. It is a great deal for the banks. They took trillions of dollars. Now, each year they get to say they made trading profits in rising quantities each year exceeding all expectations --- because nobody else did that well --- consisting almost entirely of stolen money being laundered through fictitious trades. With a guarantee of rising profits, each higher than the one before, the price earnings ratio soars and the bank's stock goes up like a moon launch.

Why do they need Foreclosures? To complete the illusion and put a cap on their potential liability to return money to the government on sales of bonds they never owned, to the insurers for the same reason, to the guarantors of loans that never existed, and to counterparties on credit default swaps. That is 500 cents on the dollar. Every foreclosure represents the end to that liability. Their only problem is how to get the cap on the mortgages that are not in default.

Just imagine when the truth gets out. Because this isn't about the mortgages declared to be in default. It is about nearly all mortgages that were created 2001-2011. I don't believe any money is due on any of them.

U.S. Subpoena of Wall Street Due Diligence Firm Targets Banks

Hmm.. why not look at cede&company, they were also listed on these loans, not to mention looking into how banks are funding private hedge funds on fraudulent loans ( npl's) and paperwork they claimed to not of had , showing up!

inShare

The U.S. Justice Department has subpoenaed documents from what was Wall Street’s largest mortgage due-diligence firm as it ratchets up an investigation into bank actions in the years before the financial crisis.

The Justice Department delivered a subpoena to Clayton Holdings LLC last month for an extensive number of documents related to the firm’s work on residential mortgage-backed securities deals. Information sought includes due diligence reports, internal communications related to reviews of pools of loans and correspondence with clients, according to a copy of the subpoena filed as an exhibit in federal court.
The work of Clayton in the years before the subprime mortgage crisis has been used by state and federal agencies in past cases. The Shelton, Conn.-based firm so far has declined to comply with the subpoena, according to a Justice Department court filing on Aug. 27.
The fight over the subpoena underlines the Justice Department’s push to file civil claims against the largest U.S. banks related to mortgage-backed securities. Top department officials have pledged to bring more cases through a joint federal-state task force probing the deals. Clayton was a “major provider of third-party due diligence services” to the Wall Street firms that packaged mortgages into bonds for sale to investors, according to the Financial Crisis Inquiry Commission’s 2011 report.
“These documents are crucial to the United States’ investigation as to which residential mortgage-backed securities, and which businesses involved with their assembly, could give rise to” civil claims, the Justice Department said in the filing.
The department’s financial fraud task force has increased its activity in RMBS cases, suing Bank of America Corp. this month as New York-based JPMorgan Chase & Co. disclosed ongoing criminal and civil investigations. Bank of America, based in Charlotte, N.C., has denied wrongdoing and said it will fight the suit.
Private and government plaintiffs including the Federal Housing Finance Agency and New York Attorney General Eric Schneiderman have previously used information from Clayton to bolster suits against banks including JPMorgan, Bank of America, Credit Suisse Group AG and Citigroup Inc. A Clayton internal report released by the FCIC showed securitizers allowing mortgages flagged during the company’s reviews to be accepted for bond deals.
In its subpoena, issued on July 1, the Justice Department sought due diligence reviews performed by Clayton, as well as all communication between the clients for whom the company performed reviews and the employees they dealt with, according to a copy of the subpoena.
The subpoena was issued as part of a “broad and ongoing nationwide investigation into the assembly, underwriting and issuance of residential mortgage backed securities during the time period between 2005 and 2007,” the Justice Department said in its filing.
Bill Campbell, a spokesman for Clayton, didn’t respond to a phone message and email seeking comment about the subpoena. Adora Andy Jenkins, a Justice Department spokeswoman, declined to comment beyond the court filings.
The Justice Department is relying on a 1989 statute, known as the Financial Institutions Reform, Recovery and Enforcement Act, as it pursues the RMBS cases against Wall Street banks.
The law, enacted in response to the savings-and-loan crisis, allows the government to seek, for as long as 10 years, civil penalties for losses to federally insured financial companies. Standard securities fraud cases must be brought within a five-year time limit.
Attorney General Eric Holder, in a statement after the department and the Securities and Exchange Commission sued Bank of America for allegedly misleading investors in an $850 million mortgage-backed bond, said the U.S. would “pursue a range of additional investigations” in the future.
“We will continue to use every tool, resource and appropriate authority to ensure stability, accountability and—above all—justice for those who have been victimized,” Holder said on Aug. 6.
The Justice Department’s Residential Mortgage Backed Securities Working Group, established last year by President Barack Obama, has taken the lead on a series of investigations related to financial crisis-era deals.
The group took on a mix of continuing civil and criminal investigations and new probes into misrepresentations by originators and underwriters on the quality of mortgages backing the securities, failures to repurchase problem loans and failures to transfer ownership of collateral.
The group has a broad mandate to investigate “any harm suffered by American consumers” related to misrepresentations or failures in agreements related to the securities, according to a Jan. 27, 2012, memo by Holder.

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More Banks Could Face Scrutiny over Foreclosure Billing Practices

MAKE SURE YOU DIRECT THIS INFORMATION TO YOUR LAWYERS .

inShare2

Federal and state regulators are ratcheting up scrutiny of the practice of padding foreclosure expenses, putting mortgage servicers on notice that they are responsible for making sure that fees charged by attorneys and third-party vendors are reasonable and accurate.

Two large servicers have already received subpoenas relating to vendors' billing practices and sources say that the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau is preparing to subpoena other servicers to determine if borrowers in foreclosure are being overcharged by vendors or paying for services that were not actually delivered.
The charges billed to borrowers in foreclosure range from posting a legal notice in a newspaper to preparing documents to recording a foreclosure at a county recorder's office. The concern is that vendors are overbilling borrowers and servicers are not properly monitoring the vendors.
"The servicers will be held accountable for not having audited or not managing the expenses better," says Tim Rood, a partner at consulting firm the Collingwood Group. "These enforcement actions are just getting started."
Banks typically outsource the processing of foreclosures to local attorneys, foreclosure trustees and a host of vendors, including property preservation companies.
Regulators have a strong interest in cracking down on vendors' billing practices because most mortgages are guaranteed or insured by Fannie Mae, Freddie Mac and the Federal Housing Administration. In most cases, the borrower has defaulted on the loan and exited the home, so it's the government agencies—and therefore, taxpayers—that are on the hook for the foreclosure costs.
For servicers that have already filed claims to be reimbursed for foreclosure expenses, the government can assess "treble damages" for violating the False Claims Act. Such fines and penalties could potentially be "onerous," says Rood.
The CFPB issued an industry bulletin in April warning banks and nonbanks that they will be held accountable and could face fines for the actions of third-party service providers. Examiners want proof that vendors are not overcharging consumers and that fees reflect the true costs of a service.
"In servicing, you have attorneys that pass the cost on to the servicer, who passes the costs on to the borrower or investor without any due diligence of whether that's the true cost of the service," says Christopher Sicuranza, a managing director of financial services at the consulting firm Navigant. "Banks need to understand what costs are being passed on to the consumer and whether those costs are reasonable and permissible."
The CFPB declined to comment on whether it plans to subpoena mortgage servicers. Other regulators, though, have already started cracking down.
PNC Financial Services Group disclosed on Aug. 8 that it had received a subpoena from the U.S. attorney for the Southern District of New York for "claims for foreclosure expenses that are incurred in connection with the foreclosure of loans insured or guaranteed by FHA, Fannie Mae or Freddie Mac." PNC did not disclose when it received the subpoena but said it is cooperating with the investigation, which is in its early stages. The company declined to comment further.
Also, insurer MetLife disclosed on Aug. 7 that its affiliate MetLife Bank received a subpoena in May from the Department of Justice "requiring production of documents related to…payment of certain foreclosure-related expenses to law firms and business entities affiliated with the law firms."
New York-based MetLife said in the filing "it is possible that various state or federal regulatory and law enforcement authorities may seek monetary penalties from MetLife Bank related to foreclosure practices." The company declined further comment.
In Colorado, foreclosure billings have reached a crisis point. Colorado Attorney General John Suthers has alleged that some law firms have charged homeowners six times the market rate to post legal notices of foreclosure. The state launched an investigation into law firms that either own or have a financial interest in vendors that bill for foreclosure notices and filings.
A separate investigation by the Denver Post last week found that some foreclosure attorneys charged borrowers twice the amount to post a legal notice of foreclosure and in some cases charge even when the notices were not posted at all.
At this point, the Colorado investigation is only targeting law firms, but it is conceivable that it could eventually ensnare banks and other servicers.
"There are any number of circumstances where banks could be held responsible for attorney foreclosure practices," says Richard Gottlieb, a partner at BuckleySandler.
"The risk of outsourcing has increased substantially," adds Sicuranza. "Many of these functions are outsourced traditionally because it was cheaper to do so and the banks didn't have the expertise in their organization. What regulators have focused on is the interaction with the customer. Banks need to implement a risk-based approach to provide oversight of vendors."

Well another one walks free

 This should be taken to Federal court. Another Judge bought by

 This Judge is well aware that Mers didn't record these notes because people would learn the truth, and he let them walk. PRICELESS!!

MERS Wins Dismissal of Minnesota Counties’ Suit Over Filing Fees

inShare

Mortgage Electronic Registration Systems Inc. persuaded a judge to throw out a lawsuit by Minnesota’s Ramsey and Hennepin counties claiming the use of MERS to avoid paying mortgage-assignment filing fees violates state law.

U.S. District Judge David S. Doty in Minneapolis threw out the counties’ complaint yesterday, ruling that state law doesn’t require all transactions be recorded and only mandates what happens if they aren’t.
The applicable law says in part, “every conveyance of real estate shall be recorded in the office of the county recorder of the county where such real estate is situated; and every such conveyance not so recorded shall be void as against any subsequent purchaser in good faith and for a valuable consideration of the same real estate, or any part thereof, whose conveyance is first duly recorded.”
“Nothing in the statute suggests—either through text or punctuation—that the phrase shall be recorded is to be divorced from the surrounding text,” the judge said.
MERS, a unit of co-defendant Merscorp Holdings Inc., files mortgages as the lenders’ assignees or nominees to eliminate the need to record assignments of the notes securing those loans when they’re sold.
A closely held company based in Reston, Va., MERS describes itself on its website as a member-based organization comprising thousands of lenders, loan servicers, investors and government institutions.
Ramsey County, home of Minnesota’s capital city of St. Paul, and Hennepin County, site of the state’s most populous city, Minneapolis, filed the lawsuit in February on behalf of all the state’s counties.
They alleged the failure to make those assignments public created a public nuisance by concealing the identity of those who holding a financial stake in a property and deprived the counties of filing fees for each transaction of about $46.
Christian Siebott, an attorney for the counties, didn’t immediately reply after regular business hours yesterday to voice-mail and email messages seeking comment on the court’s decision.

Time we all go Federal

LISTEN UP. ITS TIME TO STOP USING STATE COURTS WITH THIS MORTGAGE ABUSE FROM THE BIG BANKS AND PRIVATE HEDGE FUNDS. THESE CASES NEED TO HEAD TO FEDERAL COURTS, WHERE THE JUDGES KNOW THE LAW. THIS WILL ALSO STOP THE ABUSE OF STATE COURTS ILLEGALLY GIVING HOMES AWAY AND BANKS FROM ABUSING THE SYSTEMS.

Ruling may ease loan modification runaround for homeowners facing foreclosure

After falling behind on mortgage payments in 2008, Joyce McNair reached an agreement with Bank of America to modify her loan and made 14 payments under a trial payment plan, but now is threatened with foreclosure again. A recent court ruling may help homeowners like McNair hold lenders to such agreements. 

Joyce McNair thought she'd made a breakthrough when Bank of America agreed to try modifying her mortgage to help her avoid losing her Beaverton home in foreclosure.
After six months on a plan that would make her payments a little more affordable, the bank said, it would make the modification permanent. So McNair, whose own mortgage company had failed during the housing crash, made all six payments -- then eight more while waiting for paperwork to show up finalizing the arrangement.
Instead, she received notices that her loan had been transferred and that her new loan servicer would foreclose unless she paid $231,000 in back payments and fees by the following month.
Trial payments that go on endlessly or that squeeze a few thousand dollars more from the homeowner before the lender forecloses anyway were a common complaint among struggling homeowners trying to save their homes and get back on their feet during the recession with the help of the federal Home Affordable Modification Program, or HAMP. Consumer advocates and regulators say problems converting trial modifications continue today.
Banks have argued that the trial payment plans aren't a binding contract and that completing the trial was never intended to offer a guarantee about permanent modification.
A new federal court ruling upends that argument.
The 9th Circuit Court of Appeals in San Francisco ruled this month that lenders are required under HAMP to make a loan modification permanent upon completion of a set of trial payments. Consumer attorneys and advocates say the decision is a big win for homeowners in the 9th Circuit, which includes Oregon and Washington.

Far-reaching effects

The decision in Corvello v. Wells Fargo is binding for lower federal courts in 9th Circuit states. It's not binding for state courts, but consumer attorneys say it's likely to be taken into consideration by courts that had routinely rejected modification cases in the past. "Corvello is a very important decision and should put lenders in the 9th Circuit on notice that they can't play bait and switch with borrowers anymore," said Kelly Harpster, a foreclosure defense attorney in Lake Oswego.
In the case, plaintiffs Phillip Corvello and Karen and Jeffrey Lucia, whose two cases were consolidated before the appellate court, each said Wells Fargo offered them a trial-payment plan. They said they made the required payments but were never offered the permanent modifications they had been told would be forthcoming.
"It allowed banks to avoid their obligations to borrowers merely by choosing not to send a signed modification agreement, even though the borrowers made both accurate representations and the required payments," the court ruled.
The court called the idea that Wells Fargo could be allowed to keep the trial payments unfair and an "injustice" that would be averted by its ruling.

Bank's reaction

In a statement, Wells Fargo downplayed the significance of the decision: "The 9th Circuit did not rule on the merits of the underlying cases and found only that the District Court should consider the arguments put forth by the plaintiffs. Wells Fargo has strong defenses to those arguments and is prepared to present its case in the district court." The decision follows a similar ruling by the 7th Circuit Court of Appeals in Chicago.
According to government reports on HAMP, 88 percent of completed trial modifications are successfully converted to permanent modifications after an average of three or four months of trial payments.
For the rest, a lot can go wrong.
The Consumer Financial Protection Bureau, a federal agency created in 2011 to oversee the nation's largest banks and financial firms, said this month that its reviews of mortgage servicers have uncovered disorganized and missing files for foreclosure mitigation programs, including loan modifications.
And without naming specific institutions, it faulted lenders for sloppy handling of documents when mortgage servicing is transferred, including "lack of controls" regarding the handling of documents, including modification paperwork.

"Breach of contract"

When McNair's paperwork finally did arrive in March 2013, the documents had expired even before they were sent via FedEx. She contacted the bank and was assured new documents were on the way, she says, but those never arrived. Instead, she received a notice that her loan servicing had been transferred to Nationstar Mortgage's portfolio. Rather than picking up where Bank of America left off, the new servicer threatened foreclosure unless she paid off her default within a month.
Bank of America did not return phone calls seeking comment. Nationstar declined to comment specifically on McNair's loan.
"If there's a valid modification in place when (a loan) comes to us, then we would honor that," Nationstar spokesman John Hoffman said.
Whether the trial payment plan constitutes a contract has been a point of contention virtually since the HAMP program launched, but courts rarely sided with homeowners, said Terry Scannell, a Portland foreclosure defense attorney.
"Before, judges were chucking these cases out," Scannell said. "To get one to trial on any theory was a win."
Now, Scannell says, homeowners can bring a contract claim in federal court against mortgage servicers who fail to offer a modification once the homeowner has met the terms of a trial-payment plan.
"And the statute of limitations on a contract in Oregon is six years," Scannell said. "If this happened to them and they were foreclosed on, I think they've got a breach of contract claim."
McNair has retained an attorney and set aside the amount she'd be making in payments in the meantime.
And for the former mortgage professional, the lapses seem like double the betrayal.
"I did good mortgage loans. There was no greater joy than seeing people get into their new house," she said. "Right now I feel like I couldn't put someone in a loan in good conscience."
-- Elliot Njus

Press wants to talk to people walking away from Sandy-damaged homes

Kudos goes out to Asbury Park Press-- tell your story be heard!!

Have you been denied a Reconstruction, Rehabilitation, Elevation and Mitigation grant from the state and have decided to walk away from your Sandy-damaged home? The Asbury Park Press wants to hear your story. Contact reporter Ken Serrano at kserrano@njpressmedia.com

It’s Time to Tell the Truth: Republicans Aren’t Christians

Today seems a fitting day to pass this forward.

June 2, 2013 By Allen Clifton

Republicans don’t get a lot of things, but they really don’t get Christianity – because it’s not what they follow.
See, a few decades ago the leaders of the GOP did something very intelligent.  History shows one of the easiest ways to manipulate, and control, people is through their religion.  You can get people to do horrific things in the name of “their god” by convincing them that their actions are acceptable because they are the true believers, and those they oppose are the “heathens.”
You see this with radicals of every faith.  These radical leaders take a handful of excerpts from whatever book they follow and manipulate millions into believing whatever they want.
Republicans knew two key issues could easily control millions — abortion and homosexuality.  Once they identified their two key manipulation points, all they needed to do was tie in whatever political ideology they wanted with these two religious-based beliefs and they could create a political party that was worshipped more like a faith than a political idea.
And that’s exactly what they did.  I always encourage people to stop saying Republicans represent Christianity, and call them out on what they really worship.
I call it “Republicanity” and I consider it a cult.  It’s a perversion of Christianity mixed with a political set of man-made beliefs.  These people view their devotion to the GOP on the same level they do their belief in God.  To them, the Republican party is the party of “real Christians.”  They don’t need facts or reality to support their political beliefs, they have “faith.”
Except, your political beliefs are supposed to be based on facts — not faith.
I’m a Christian, and these people damn sure don’t represent my faith.  What they follow is some mix of Ayn Rand economic ideologies and a couple of select passages from the Bible.
Which I always find hilarious considering Ayn Rand thought religious people were stupid and insane.  So people like Paul Ryan, who built his economic ideology on her teachings while claiming to be a devout “Christian,” just show their ignorance by claiming to believe in both.  How exactly can someone build an economic platform based on a woman who completely contradicted Christianity, while claiming to be a follower of Christianity?
It makes absolutely no damn sense.
See, the whole point of being a Christian means you follow the teachings of Christ.  I’ve actually seen many of these “Christians” try and say Jesus would support cuts to welfare and side with the top-down economic policies of the Republican party.
As I’ve said before, whether you believe in Jesus Christ or not is not the issue, what he symbolized and his story aren’t really debatable.  He spent his life helping the poor, sick and needy.  He never once spoke about homosexuality or abortion.  He embraced those from the lowest rungs of society by saying that those for whom much had been given, much is expected.  He taught love, hope, compassion and forgiveness.  He warned against those who would manipulate the word of God for their own selfish ambitions.  He opposed greed and encouraged giving.
You know, the exact oppose of what Republicans stand for.
But that doesn’t matter to these people because they oppose abortion and homosexuality — again, two things Jesus never spoke of.
And honestly, can you name one other “Christian” value Republicans claim to value?  Because I hate to break it to them, but guns weren’t invented by Jesus.  Saying you have a “God-given right to bear arms” is just ignorant.  God didn’t grant anyone the right to bear arms, a bunch of slave owning rich white men did in the late-1700′s.  Many of which weren’t even Christians.

So please, stop calling Republicans “Christians” — they’re not.
I can’t count the times I’ve heard people say they don’t consider themselves Christians any longer because of the ignorance of the Republican party.  Millions have abandoned Christianity because these people have hijacked a faith to distort it for their own political gains.
It’s time real Christians take back their faith from these people who’ve turned so many sour on Christianity.  It’s time they rise up against these ignorant fake Christians and call them out directly on the truth.  They don’t follow Christianity.
They follow Republicanity.  They worship Reagan, guns and greed — not Jesus Christ.

Republicans Don’t Have to Worry About Winning Over Voters, They’re Just Going to Rig Elections

August 24, 2013 

Gerrymandering, new restrictive voter ID laws, mythical voter fraud fear mongering—I’m sick to death of all of it.  The outrage over this Republican attempt to rig elections that’s going on all across this country isn’t nearly loud enough.  This should be the headline every single night on every single news channel, website and blog.
Republicans aren’t trying to “win” elections, they’re trying to rig elections—period.
And don’t even give me this rhetoric about voter fraud.  Actual cases of voter fraud have been so rare you’re far more likely to be struck by lightening than witnessing voter fraud.
And this isn’t about requiring an ID to vote.  That’s total bullcrap and they know it.  If a valid ID is the answer to this non-existent issue of voter fraud, then why hasn’t the requirement to have a valid ID proving an individual is 21 years of age put an end to underaged drinking?
Simple.  Because if someone wants to break a law, they will.  A fake ID isn’t hard to obtain and if someone is hell bent on fraudulent voting, they’re going to vote fraudulently.
But this has nothing to do with having an ID to prove a valid vote.  If it was, that’s all these laws would contain—but they don’t.
Inside many of these laws are provisions which make the requirements to vote tougher.  Measures which restrict voting dates and times.  Cuts in funding which force the closure of DMV’s (you know, the offices through which most people obtain a valid ID) which make it harder for people to get a valid ID.


Then there are the laws which change residency requirements so many college students are unable to vote, because these laws require an individual to maintain a residence of at least 12 months.  Something many students don’t do due to the fact they live at school when class is in session and back at home when it’s not.
Oh, then there are the laws which say a state-issued student ID isn’t valid for voting.  Tell me, in what alternate reality could that possibly make any sense whatsoever?
It’s a clear strategy to prevent many college students from being able to vote.  And who do college students tend to vote for much more often?  Oh, that’s right, Democrats.
Then there’s the whole issue of it being illegal to charge a poll tax for residents to vote.
Now I can hear the Republican response already, “But you can get ID’s for free!”  No—not really.
Sure, some states offer a free ID for individuals that fall below a certain income bracket, but free isn’t free—they’re still paid for by taxpayers.  Not only that, but what if some of those individuals don’t have a copy of their birth certificate?  Well, that does cost money.
And it’s not always easy to get to an office to obtain a copy of a birth certificate.  In some counties there’s only one location for an entire county.  Think of a rural county where someone doesn’t own a car, they have no public transportation system where someone lives some forty or fifty miles from the nearest office to obtain a birth certificate.  How are they supposed to get one?
Voting sites are often within a couple of miles, even in rural areas.  But DMV’s and offices to obtain a birth certificate are often must less accessible.
So there’s no circumstance where a prospective voter, who lacks a birth certificate and an ID, wouldn’t be required in some way to pay to obtain the right to vote.
And that is a poll tax—which is illegal.
It doesn’t even matter how much money someone makes, if they have to pay for an ID (with an ID being required to vote) that is still charging someone for their right to vote.  The level of individual income has no bearing on laws.  If anyone is in anyway charged in any manner prior to being given the right to vote—that is a poll tax. 
Then there’s the out of control gerrymandering Republicans have been doing for years.  You know, the gerrymandering similar to that being done in Texas.  A state that recently admitted that they were specifically redrawing districts to weaken the power of Democrats in Texas.
You see, what Republicans like to do is take a district which usually votes for Democrats, split it up, pair it off with conservative-leaning districts then create 2 (or more) conservative-leaning congressional districts instead of one liberal-leaning one.


It’s how Democrats won the popular vote in Congress this past November by over one million total votes yet still don’t control the House of Representatives.
Get it now?  Republicans don’t need to win elections—they’ll just rig them.  They’ll simply redraw districts to blatantly favor conservative voters or pass voting laws which directly target the voting patterns of specific demographics which often don’t vote for Republicans—or both.
It’s a deliberate attempt by Republicans to undermine our voting process under the guise of “fighting rampant voter fraud.”
Except, there’s absolutely no evidence of any “rampant voter fraud.”  A fact that they’re well aware of, they just simply don’t care.  Anyone who really thinks these laws are about fighting non-existent voter fraud is either an idiot or simply in denial.  Because Republicans couldn’t be more obvious about what they’re trying to do—and that’s rig elections.
Because conservatives are quickly realizing they’re soon not going to be able to actually win them fair and square.

FHA Planning Next Nonperforming Note Sale

WHO ARE THEY KIDDING - NOT ALLOWED TO FORECLOSE ON PROPERTIES FOR 3 YEARS.. PLEASE .. ONCE BOUGHT THEY RUN TO THE COURTS . SO SICK OF THIS DAMN GOVERNMENT AND NOT PROTECTING THE PEOPLE WHO WERE HARMED.

inShare1

The bid date for the Federal Housing Administration’s next note sale of nonperforming loans is tentatively scheduled for mid-October, according to HUD officials.

The Department of Housing and Urban Development generally tries to hold a FHA note sale every quarter. But the third quarter sale has been moved to October. SEBA Professional Services LLP will be managing the note sale and DebtX will market the sale.
The FHA held its last “national sale” on June 26 when it accepted bids on nearly 15,470 nonperforming loans with an unpaid principal balance of $2.4 billion. The winning bids totaled $1.26 billion or 53.4% of the UPB of the loans, which are no longer insured by FHA. There were 13 pools and eight winning bidders.
In September 2012, FHA conducted a sale of 5,300 nonperforming loans and the winning bids totaled $368 million or 39% of the UPB. An improving housing market has helped increase FHA recoveries.
FHA servicers generally select their worst loans—where they exhausted all loss mitigation options—for these note sales. Under the terms of the sale, the successful bidders cannot foreclose for six months. This restriction is designed to give the new servicer a chance to restructure the loan and keep the borrower in their home.
In early November, FHA will conduct another Neighborhood Stabilization note sale. The winning bidders of these notes cannot foreclose for three years.

Elizabeth Warren’s secret: The Salon interview

Thursday, Aug 22, 2013 07:45 AM EST

The senator tells Salon how one senator can wield tremendous power -- and (kind of) addresses those '16 rumors

By David Dayen

Topics: Elizabeth Warren, interview, Massachusetts, U.S. Senate, Editor's Picks, Banks, Glass-Steagall, SEC, Business News, Politics News

Massachusetts Sen. Elizabeth Warren (Credit: Reuters/Eric Thayer)

It’s been well-documented that the 113th Congress specializes in getting nothing consequential done. While the nation’s supply of named post offices is apparently well-stocked, anything more critical has generally stalled out, with little hope to break the gridlock.
So let’s say you’re a high-profile freshman senator walking into this den of inertia, and you want to make your large following proud and advance your agenda, but you’re in no position to do that legislatively? How do you, Elizabeth Warren, find your way through this minefield, and even chalk up successes?
“It’s all about learning to use the new tools,” Warren told Salon in an interview this week. “In the Senate, there are more tools in the toolbox than are obvious.” Warren, now the senior senator from Massachusetts (Ed Markey, with a 37-year congressional career, is the junior member), has employed those more unconventional tools effectively, doing her part to both change the conversation around the financial industry inside and outside Washington, and change the sharpness of the regulatory response to financial misdeeds.
Warren sits on the Senate Banking Committee, which has marked up all of two bills so far this year (she played a role in both, passing an amendment to a national insurance licensing bill and working closely with the committee leadership on reforming the Federal Housing Administration). But she has really shone in oversight hearings, where she has gained a reputation for offering uncomfortable questions to regulatory officials about their lack of prosecuting criminal activity on Wall Street.  “Too big to fail has become too big for trial,” she said at a hearing in February. “How big do the biggest banks have to get before we consider breaking them up?” she asked Treasury Secretary Jack Lew in May. And she’s used the bully pulpit outside the hearing room, too, schooling CNBC anchors so badly on the history of financial regulation that the network forced the clip to be removed from YouTube.

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This creates a consequence for the regulators for lax enforcement. Nobody wants to end up on the business end of an Elizabeth Warren viral video, and the hope is that the prodding will spur the regulators into action, or at least keep them alert. “There’s a lot that banking regulators can do to make the system safer without Congress passing any new laws,” Warren told Salon. “But only if they do their jobs. It’s about accountability in both directions. The largest financial institutions should be held accountable, and so should the regulators.”
She added, “They are not there to serve the banks, they are there to serve the public. I’m reminded of that when we have public hearings. I try to ask questions that the public wants to hear.”
This extends beyond the occasional badgering of witnesses (“I beg your pardon,” said Warren when I termed it that way, though she misunderstood, as I have a great affection for badgering). In one of her first major actions, Warren opened an investigation into the Independent Foreclosure Review, which was supposed to review every foreclosure from 2009-2010 for errors, but ended up so botched (the banks picked their own reviewers) that regulators shut it down and gave wronged homeowners a seemingly random amount of cash compensation, typically around $300. Warren demanded information on how the aborted reviews were conducted, what they found and how regulators arrived at the final penalties. After a series of embarrassing hearings on the subject, last month Federal Reserve chairman Ben Bernanke promised the release of some details, though none have yet come out.
Other agencies have come to expect Warren’s queries. Just yesterday, she asked the Justice Department about why it settled with five large banks who submitted fraudulent mortgage insurance claims to the FHA for $225 million, when based on the number of claims made public in a government report, the damages could have been as high as $37 billion. That comes out to a settlement for 0.6 percent of potential damages.
Warren has had more luck with the Securities and Exchange Commission, which she previously criticized for generating settlements with giant financial institutions on securities fraud and other violations without making the guilty party admit wrongdoing. Corporations can’t stand this because they expose themselves to future litigation, could suffer reputational risk and even lose their banking licenses. But putting this price on misconduct could have a tremendous deterrent effect (in addition, fines in cases where the defendant admits wrongdoing are not tax deductible).
The Massachusetts senator used both hearings and a series of letters to new SEC chairwoman Mary Jo White to question the policy. This has borne fruit: White announced a new settlement policy that will require admissions of guilt in more cases. “I’m very optimistic about the direction Mary Jo White is taking the SEC,” Warren said. “She didn’t make a generalized ‘we’re going to get tough’ statement, she identified a class of cases in which the agency would take a different position, with harsher consequences for companies that don’t cooperate.”
“Commissioner White is showing some real spirit,” Warren added. “She has come in and made it clear that it’s a new day in town.”
Just this week, hedge fund manager Philip Falcone admitted wrongdoing in a settlement over improper use of funds at Harbinger Capital, the first individual to do so since White announced the new policy. While Falcone didn’t admit to liability on specific violations of law, Warren called it a “step in the right direction,” and an indication that “the SEC is a watchdog that’s starting to show some teeth.”
So while critics call Warren’s verbal jabs mere showboating, combined with her persistence they have had a tangible impact, both exposing some bank-friendly regulators and spurring others to better alternatives. “Those who criticize her for being all talk and no achievements don’t understand the Senate,” said Jeff Connaughton, a former chief of staff to Sen. Ted Kaufman who wrote an appreciation of Warren earlier this year. “I think she and others have made regulators think twice about how kid glove treatment of the banks will look in a harsh Senate spotlight.”
Warren has also done plenty of unsung work in her freshman year. She actually has the highest attendance at Banking Committee proceedings so far this year, making 27 out of 35 hearings and executive sessions, more than chairman Tim Johnson or ranking member Mike Crapo. And in hearings, she almost always stays from start to finish, learning from her fellow members’ questioning and often tailoring hers to cover a different subject area. “I learn a lot from those hearings,” Warren said. “Not everyone is engaged, but there’s a core of people really interested in the issues and really driving them.”
The freshman senator named her Banking Committee colleagues Sherrod Brown and Jeff Merkley as part of this core group. (She even had nice words to say for Republican Bob Corker, whom she has worked with on the future of Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac “since before I was a senator.”) Another reformer, Carl Levin, has made a habit of using his Permanent Subcommittee on Investigations to delve into issues of financial crimes, most recently with the “London Whale” trade by JPMorgan Chase. Levin’s report was instrumental in the criminal indictments of two ex-traders at the bank for hiding losses and lying to regulators and investors. “Progress on the London Whale and admit or deny has come because of three or four determined senators and despite two captured committees,” argued Jeff Connaughton.
The increased scrutiny has a cumulative effect. When one regulatory agency like the SEC changes its policy, it provokes other agencies to consider toughening theirs. When one senator points the way toward more provocative questioning of the broken regulatory response to a tsunami of financial crimes, other senators want in on the act. “She has elevated ‘the game’ of other senators,” said Bartlett Naylor of Public Citizen. “No longer can her peers survive a committee hearing on a one-minute staff briefing before asking a question written for them, if it might be at odds with one of her positions.”
Warren is hoping such momentum-building will play out in her first banking legislation, which would reinstate the Depression-era “Glass-Steagall” protections separating commercial banking (like taking deposits and making loans) from investment banking (like trading derivatives and other Wall Street casino gambling pursuits). Critics allege that the Glass-Steagall repeal had nothing to do with the financial crisis. But in a system where those duties are separated, Warren believes, regulators would have an easier time at their jobs. “They wouldn’t have to develop expertise in multiple lines of business,” she said. “The SEC can oversee the non-bank institutions, and bank regulators could focus on the safety of banks.” While all big legislation faces a long road in a divided Washington, Warren partnered with Republican John McCain, Democrat Maria Cantwell and Independent Angus King on the Glass-Steagall bill to raise its profile, using an outside-inside approach. “We’re two freshmen and two members not on the Banking Committee,” Warren said, “and we got together to make this a more urgent issue.”
Regardless of the eventual outcome of that bill, Warren has learned that a senator has power if he or she knows how to wield it. As for how else she can make an impact, Jeff Connaughton has a suggestion. “Run for president.”
I asked if she had any reaction to that kind of buzz. The senator had a pat response. “No!”
Read the full transcript of our conversation here.

65 SIGNS THAT YOUR FORECLOSURE DOCUMENTS COULD BE FRAUDULENT

Sadly I have to many on this list and a Judge still approved it

1.     The Mortgage or Deed of Trust is assigned from the Originator directly to the Trustee for the Securitized Trust.
2.     The Mortgage or Deed of Trust is assigned months and sometimes years after the date of the origination of the underlying mortgage note.
3.     The Mortgage or Deed of Trust is assigned from the initial aggregator directly to the Securitized Trust with no assignments to the Depositor or the Sponsor for the Trust.
4.     The Mortgage or Deed of Trust is executed, dated or assigned in a manner inconsistent with the mandatory governing rules of Section 2.01 of the Pooling and Servicing Agreement.
5.     The assignment of the Mortgage or Deed of Trust is executed by a legal entity that was no longer in existence on the date the document was executed.
6.     The assignment of the mortgage or Deed of Trust is executed by an entity whose name is different than the entity named in the original document (i.e., National City Bank Corporation in lieu of ABC Corporation as a division of National City Bank).
7.     The assignment was executed by a party pursuant to a Power of Attorney but no Power of Attorney is attached to the instrument or filed with the instrument or otherwise recorded with local land registry.
8.     The mortgage note is allegedly transferred in a single document along with the Mortgage or Deed of Trust (i.e., “Assignment of the Note and Mortgage”).  You cannot “assign” a mortgage note.  You can only “negotiate” a mortgage note under Article 3 of the UCC.
9.     The assignment is executed by a party who claims to be an “attorney in fact” for the assignor.
10.    The assignment is notarized by a notary in Dakota County, Minnesota.
11.    The assignment is notarized by a notary in Hennepin County, Minnesota.
12.    The assignment is notarized by a notary in Duval County, Florida.
13.    The assignment is executed by an officer or secretary of MERS.
14.    The assignment is notarized by a secretary or paralegal employed by the attorney for the mortgage servicer.
15.    The assignment is executed or notarized by an employee of MR Default Services, Promiss Solutions LLC, National Default Exchange, LP, LOGS Financial Services, or some similar third-party.
16.    The endorsement on the note is actually on an allonge affixed to the note.  In most states, an allonge cannot be used if there is a sufficient amount of room at the “foot” or the “bottom” of the original note for the endorsement.
17.    The allonge is not “permanently” affixed to the original note.  The term permanent excludes the use of staples and tape and as a result you must use a sold fastener such as glue.  Allonges are commonly referred to “in the business” as “tear-off fraud papers.”
18.    The note proffered in evidence is not the original but a copy of the “certified copy” provided to the debtors at the closing.
19.    The note is endorsed in blank with no transfer and delivery receipts.  It is fine to endorse a note in blank, in which case it becomes “bearer” paper under the UCC.  However, in order to prove a true sale from the Sponsor to the Depositor you must have written delivery and transfer receipts and proof of pay outs and pay in transactions.
20.    The note proffered in evidence is not endorsed at the foot of the note or on an affixed allonge.
21.    The assignment of the mortgage or deed of trust post-dates the filing of the court pleading.
22.    The assignment of the mortgage or deed of trust is executed after the filing of the court pleadings but claims to be “legally effective” before the filing.  For example, the deed of trust is assigned on June 1, 2009, with an effective date of May 1, 2007.
23.    The parties who executed the assignment and who notarized the signature are in fact the same parties.
24.    The signor states that he or she is an “agent” for the executing entity.
25.    The signor states that he or she is an “attorney in fact” for the executing entity.
26.    The signor states that he or she is an employee of the executing entity but claims to have custody and control of the records of the entity.
27.    The signor of the document makes statements about the status of the mortgage debt based on his or her review of the “records of the plaintiff” or the “records of the moving party.”
28.    The proponent of the original note files an Affidavit of Lost Note.
29.    The signor claims that the allegations in the court pleading are correct but the assignment of the mortgage and/or delivery and transfer of the note occurs after the law suit or the motion for relief from stay was filed.
30.    One or more of the operative documents in the case is signed by one of the attorneys for the mortgage servicer.
31.    The default payment history filed in the case is prepared by the attorney for the mortgage servicer or a member of his or her staff.
32.    The affidavit filed in support of legal fees is not signed by an attorney with the firm involved in the case.
33.    The name of one or more of the signors is stamped on the document.
34.    The document is a form with standard “fill-in-the-blanks” for names and amounts.
35.    The signature of one or more parties on the document is not legible and looks like something a three year old might have done.
36.    The document is dated and signed years before the document is actually filed with the register of real estate documents or deeds or mortgages.
37.    The proffered document has the word C O P Y stamped on or embedded in the document.
38.    The document is executed by a notary in Denton County, Texas.
39.    The document is executed by a notary in Collin County, Texas.
40.    The document includes a legend “Hold for” a named law firm after recording.
41.    The document was drafted by a law firm representing the mortgage servicer in the pending case.
42.    The document includes any type of bar code that was not added by the local register or filing clerk for such instruments.
43.    The document includes a reference to an “instrument number.”
44.    The document includes a reference to a “form number.”
45.    The document does not include any reference to a Master Document Custodian.
46.    The document is not authenticated by any officer or authorized agent of a Master Document Custodian.
47.    The paragraph numbers on the document are not consistent (the last paragraph on page one is 7 and the first paragraph on page two starts with number 9).
48.    The endorsement of the note is not at the “foot” or “bottom” of the last page of the note.  For example, a few states allow an endorsement on the back of the last page of the note but the majority requires it at the foot of the note.
49.    The document purports to assign the mortgage or the deed of trust to the Trustee for the Securitized Trust before the Trust was registered with the Securities and Exchange Commission.  This type of registration is normally referred to as a “shelf registration.”
50.    The document purports to transfer the note to the Trustee for the Securitized Trust before the date the Trust provides for the origination date of instruments in the Trust.  The Prospectus, the Prospectus Supplement and the Pooling and Servicing Agreement will clearly state that the pool of notes includes those originated between date X and date Y.
51.    The document purports to transfer the note to the Trustee for the Securitized Trust after the cut-off date for the creating of such instruments for the Trust.
52.    The origination date on the mortgage note is not within the origination and cut-off dates provided for the by terms of the Pooling and Servicing Agreement.
53.    The “Affidavit of a Lost Note” is not filed by the Master Document Custodian for the Trust but by the Servicer or some other third-party.
54.    The document is signed by a “bank officer” without any designation of the office held by the said officer.
55.    The affidavit includes the following language on the bottom of each page:  “This is an attempt to collect a debt.  Any information obtained will be used for that purpose.”
56.    The document is signed by a person who identifies himself or herself as a “media supervisor” for the proponent.
57.    The document is signed by a person who identifies himself or herself as a “media coordinator” for the proponent.
58.    The document is signed by a person who identifies himself or herself as a “legal coordinator” for the movant.
59.    The date of the signature on the document and the date the signature was notarized are not the same.
60.    The parties who signed the assignment and who notarized the signature are located in different states or counties.
61.    The transferor and the transferee have the same physical address including the same street and post office box numbers.
62.    The assignor and the assignee have the same physical address including the same street and post office box numbers.
63.    The signor of the document states that he or she is acting “solely as nominee” for some other party.
64.    The document refers to a power of attorney but no power of attorney is attached.
65.    The document bears the following legend:  “This is not a certified copy.”

Assured Guaranty, JPMorgan Agree to End Mortgage Suits

I had assured -- I know many more did as well ..if you had Washington Mutual, Deutsche bank or one of its many different counterparts like DB Structured Products

By Chris Dolmetsch - Aug 21, 2013 4:02 PM ET

Assured Guaranty Ltd. (AGO) and JPMorgan Chase & Co. (JPM) agreed to settle lawsuits filed by the bond insurer accusing the bank’s EMC Mortgage and Bear Stearns units of making misrepresentations about mortgage-backed securities.
Assured Guaranty Corp., a New York-based unit of the Hamilton, Bermuda-based bond insurer, sued EMC, J.P. Morgan Securities Inc. and JPMorgan Chase Bank NA in state and federal court in New York starting in 2010, alleging violations of representations and warranties in connection with three residential mortgage-backed securities transactions.
JPMorgan and Assured reached an agreement resolving the claims this month, according to a filing with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission dated Aug. 9. Terms of the settlement weren’t disclosed in the filing.
Assured still has similar suits pending against other lenders, including Deutsche Bank AG, Germany’s biggest lender, and Credit Suisse AG, Switzerland’s largest bank, according to its SEC filing.
Pools of home loans securitized into bonds were a central part of the housing bubble that helped send the U.S. into the biggest recession since the 1930s. The housing market collapsed, and the crisis swept up lenders and investment banks as the market for the securities evaporated.
Ashweeta Durani, a spokeswoman for Assured Guaranty in New York, said in a telephone interview that she couldn’t comment beyond the regulatory filing. Jennifer Zuccarelli, a spokeswoman for New York-based JPMorgan, didn’t immediately respond to an e-mail seeking comment.
The state court case is Assured Guaranty Corp. v. EMC Mortgage LLC, 650805/2012, New York State Supreme Court, New York County (Manhattan.)

Several Big Banks Forge Mortgage Documents

Several Big Banks Forge Mortgage Documents, New Unsealed Documents Show

Posted on August 21, 2013 by Joshua De Leon •

Last year, some Wall Street banks settled in a fraud lawsuit for $95 million, filed by Florida resident and white-collar fraud specialist, Lynn Szymoniak. The lawsuit named 28 “banks, mortgage servicers and document processing companies,” and was filed in federal courts in North and South Carolina.

The scam consisted of the banks drawing up fake mortgage documents “because they could not legally establish true ownership of the loans when trying to foreclose.”
The lawsuit, recently unsealed, exposes some nasty secrets about the way in which banks handled the lawsuit and what that handling means. David Dayen with Salon, reported because the banks settled, rather than fought the suit, there are “tens of millions of mortgages in America [that] still lack a legitimate chain of ownership.” These tens of millions have been estimated to equal up to trillions of dollars. And because the mortgage documents are forgeries, there is no “underlying owner” that can rightfully foreclose on these mortgages.
What the banks were doing is sending off securities that were not mortgage-backed. They were essentially empty securities. As Syzmoniak points out, the “Defendants used fraudulent mortgage assignments to conceal that over 1400 MBS trusts, . . are missing critical documents.” The banks would push out these non-mortgage backed securities and eventually created over $1.4 trillion of worthless mortgages and securities.
A crucial piece of evidence in the lawsuit was that, in 2009, one “Assignment of Mortgage was inadvertently not recorded prior to the Final Judgement of Foreclosure.” This makes the underlying ownership of the mortgage invalid because that finding proved that the “mortgage assignment was not made before the closing date of the trust.”
Because these documents were faked, mortgages “were materially harmed by the subsequent impaired value of the securities.” The banks committed fraud to the most severe degree. They created $1.4 trillion in non-mortgage-backed securities, but they were able to settle by only paying a fraction of the amount they defrauded. And they even lied to the Securities and Exchange Commission about the valuelessness of the mortgages. No one was put in handcuffs, no one was convicted.
Despite the five largest banks settling, Szymoniak can still bring other banks like HSBC, Bank of New York Mellon, and Deutsche Bank to trial to seek retribution of their crimes.

CFPB Claims Many Non-Banks Are Out of Compliance

Wed, 2013-08-21 16:09 — 

The Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (CFPB) issued a report, "Supervisory Highlights: Summer 2013," detailing mortgage servicing problems at banks and nonbanks. The report also found that many nonbanks lack robust systems for ensuring they are following federal laws.
“Our examinations of banks and nonbanks allow us to correct problems before more consumers are affected,” said CFPB Director Richard Cordray. “Today’s report highlights both the mortgage servicing problems throughout the industry and the challenges of making sure that nonbanks are following federal law. Fixing both is a priority for us.”
Under the Dodd-Frank Wall Street Reform and Consumer Protection Act (Dodd-Frank), the CFPB supervises depository institutions and credit unions with total assets of more than $10 billion, and their affiliates. The Bureau also has authority to supervise nonbanks regardless of size in certain specific markets: payday lenders; private education lenders; and mortgage companies including originators, brokers, and servicers. For other nonbank markets for consumer financial products or services, the CFPB has the authority to supervise “larger participants.” As directed by Dodd-Frank, the Bureau must define such larger participants by rule. To date, the Bureau has issued rules for the debt collection and credit reporting markets.
The report is part of a series of supervision reports that the CFPB issues regularly. It highlights examination work completed between November 2012 and June 2013.
Mortgage Servicing Problems
Since the CFPB launched its supervision program, it has focused much of its work on mortgage servicing. Mortgage servicers are responsible for collecting payments from mortgage borrowers on behalf of loan owners. They also typically handle customer service, escrow accounts, collections, loan modifications, and foreclosures. In supervising both bank and nonbank servicers, CFPB examiners have uncovered problems that can be harmful to consumers. These include:
Sloppy account transfers: The rights to manage a loan are frequently bought and sold among servicers. With these transfers among institutions, the CFPB discovered several risks that can cause consumers to miss payments, delay important processes, or affect the good standing of a mortgage borrower’s loan. For example, examiners found:
►Disorganized and unlabeled paperwork, including important loss mitigation documents
►Failures by mortgage servicers to tell consumers when the servicing of the loan is transferred to another company; and
►A lack of protocols related to the handling of key documents, such as trial modification agreements.
Poor payment processing: Servicers are responsible for processing loan payments and handling tax and insurance payments through escrow accounts. If they do not perform their duties correctly, it can result in extra costs and hassles for the consumer. In its exams, the CFPB found:
►Inadequate notice to borrowers of a change in address to send payments, resulting in late payments;
►Excessive delays in handling the cancellation of private mortgage insurance payments, resulting in late fees; and
►Property taxes being paid later than expected, resulting in borrowers’ inability to claim a tax deduction for the year they planned.
Loss mitigation mistakes: Servicers are also responsible for helping qualified struggling borrowers with alternative plans for repayments, if such plans are available. So when servicers fall short of their responsibilities, consumers can be sent to foreclosure unnecessarily. CFPB examiners discovered several problems, including:
►Inconsistent communications with borrowers, giving them conflicting instructions for loss mitigation processes;
►Inconsistent loss mitigation underwriting, waiving certain fees and interest charges for some borrowers but not others;
►Long application review periods, making the loss mitigation process especially hard on consumers whose accounts are also dual-tracked for foreclosure;
►Incomplete loan files, making it challenging for consumers to find out about their loan modification applications when they call the servicer for help;
►Poor procedures for requesting missing or incomplete information from consumers, making it difficult for consumers to provide the correct documentation; and
►Deceptive communications to borrowers about the status of loan modification applications, leading some consumers to faster foreclosure.
In all cases where the CFPB found mortgage servicing problems, examiners alerted the company to its concerns, specified necessary remedial measures, and, when appropriate, opened CFPB investigations for potential enforcement actions. CFPB’s corrective measures included making sure that important papers were filed appropriately, that servicers improved their policies and procedures governing the handling of loans in loss mitigation, and that consumers were treated according to the law.
The CFPB has also directed servicers to engage in specific corrective actions appropriate to the circumstances, such as: reviewing loss mitigation decisions and related fees or charges to borrowers to determine whether any reimbursement was appropriate; conducting periodic testing to monitor areas of concern; and providing reports to the CFPB on their progress completing the corrective actions.
Many Nonbanks Lack Compliance Management Systems
The CFPB expects the companies it supervises – regardless of size – to have fully developed compliance management systems to ensure all federal consumer financial protection laws are followed. A good system ensures that employees know about their responsibilities, creates structures for reviewing operations, and takes corrective actions when needed. A good system also lessens consumer risks and reduces the potential for violations.
Prior to the CFPB’s existence, many supervised nonbanks had not been subject to federal or even state examinations. Perhaps because of this, CFPB examiners found that many nonbanks are more likely to lack robust compliance management systems. The Bureau found that many nonbank institutions are:
Missing a comprehensive consumer compliance program: The CFPB found that often individual branches of a business were looking out for relevant federal laws without an overarching system in place at the company. This creates a lack of consistency in following the laws across products and across locations. The result can be erratic treatment of consumer problems. It can also mean that root causes of regulatory violations go undetected.
Lacking formal policies and procedures: Not having formal, written documents that both detail consumer compliance responsibilities and instruct employees on the appropriate methods for executing these responsibilities can lead to inconsistencies, sloppy recordkeeping, and ultimately, consumer harm because nobody at the institution is clearly responsible to make sure laws are being followed.
Forgoing independent consumer compliance audits: Independent audits are a good way for a company to routinely conduct quality-control checks on its operations. A compliance audit program provides a board of directors or its designated committees with information about whether policies and standards are being implemented. Without such a program, it is difficult to recognize any significant deficiencies in an institution’s compliance management system.