Posted on 08/11/2010 8:52:48 AM PDT by Chunga85
Attorney General Bill McCollum News Release:
Florida Law Firms Subpoenaed Over Foreclosure Filing Practices
TALLAHASSEE, FL – Attorney General Bill McCollum today announced his office has launched three new investigations into allegations of unfair and deceptive actions by Florida law firms handling foreclosure cases. The Attorney General’s Economic Crimes Division is investigating whether improper documentation may have been created and filed with Florida courts to speed up foreclosure processes, potentially without the knowledge or consent of the homeowners involved.
The new investigations name The Law Offices of Marshall C. Watson, P.A.; Shapiro & Fishman, LLP; and the Law Offices of David J. Stern, P.A. The law firms were hired by loan servicers to begin foreclosure proceedings when consumers were in arrears on their mortgages.
Because many mortgages have been bought and sold by different institutions multiple times, key paperwork involved in the process to obtain foreclosure judgments is often missing. On numerous occasions, allegedly fabricated documents have been presented to the courts in foreclosure actions to obtain final judgments against homeowners. Thousands of final judgments of foreclosure against Florida homeowners may have been the result of the allegedly improper actions of the law firms under investigation.
The Attorney General’s Office is also investigating whether the law firms have created affiliated companies outside the United States where the allegedly false documents are being prepared and then submitted to the law firms for use.
Subpoenas have been served on each of the law firms listed above, and the investigations are ongoing.
(Excerpt) Read more at myfloridalegal.com ...
http://www.scribd.com/doc/35674522/Foreclosure-Fraud-David-J-Stern-Attorney-General-Subpoena
Read Marshall C. Watson's subpoena here:
http://www.scribd.com/doc/35674561/Foreclosure-Fraud-Marshall-C-Watson-Attorney-General-Subpoena
Read Shapiro Fishman subpoena here:
http://www.scribd.com/doc/35674561/Foreclosure-Fraud-Marshall-C-Watson-Attorney-General-Subpoena
Must be some interesting chit chat around the water-cooler in these offices today!
http://www.foreclosurehamlet.org
Better late than never.
>>...allegedly fabricated documents have been presented to the courts...<<
Would that be fraud, forgery, perjury, or all three?
What a tangled web we weave.
Most likely this is an election season stunt. McCollum is seven points behind Rick Scott.
FL is a haven for scam artists of all stripes. Cashback America, telemarketers, “collection agencies,” etal.
To his credit McCollum took Cashback America to court. Three years ago....
Interesting timing.
Only thing I have seen was a post on FR about how Scott's healthcare companies were singled out by the Feds for prosecution after opposing Hillary-Care.
Can anyone enlighten me further about Scott?
I prefer him to McCollum, who left me cold with his statement about AZ immigration law(which he has since renounced and denied), since he polls better against Chicken-Lips Alex Sink, but I do wish I could vote for him without holding my nose.
South Florida Business Journal
This is just the tip of the iceberg.
This story can’t be true. Lawyers are very ethical and moral people.
(1) Buying up not-for-profit hospitals at low prices while convincing his investors that they were worth far more. This strategy came a cropper when Columbia actually had to make money by running the hospitals rather than by booking dubious asset values on the acquisitions.
That led to
(2) Overbilling the Medicare program to the extent that they pled guilty to Medicare fraud and coughed up a $745 million settlement.
Rick's timing was excellent, he had pulled the ripcord on his parachute just before.....
The AG spot is now a stepping stone for governor. You can do all sorts of grandstanding in that job. It worked for Crist, and Spitzer, and now Moonbean is giving it a try in CA.
fraud because the documents are fake and the cases have born that out
forgery because the documents are presented as factual.
perjury because as officers of the court these attorneys were representing them as real.
The goal of the firm was to set up a paper wall so they would have plausable deniability to the fraudulent nature of the documents.
I wonder if you can disbar a firm. :-\
>>The AG spot is now a stepping stone for governor. You can do all sorts of grandstanding in that job. It worked for Crist, and Spitzer, and now Moonbean is giving it a try in CA.<<
Didn’t work so well for ol’ what’s his name on that Duke LaCross case. ;)
no only lawyers.
this is why these firms used fresh out of law school hirees in order to create an extra layer of deniability.
Many of these document processing companies were producing documents outside the usa for the law firm.
The firms were raking in big money by simply not mediating in good faith. But in a way that preserved the mediation requirement.
Many people may find themselves owning their homes free of the promissory note and mortgage because of improper conduct of the firm and/or the unprovable chain of custody.
no this is a very legitimate problem and will continue long after this election.
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