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This article in on foreclosure fraud today’s Journal News features two things, one that is incredibly disheartening and another that gives me some hope.
Disheartening: The incredible incongruities and obvious sham filings just to shunt repossessions through are chillingly obvious. For example, one of the bank officials signing on behalf of Washington Mutual is dated after Wamu was dissolved.
Encouraging: Lawyers (I can’t believe I am writing “encouraging” and “Lawyers” in the same sentence) are starting to counter punch the fraud on behalf of aggrieved borrowers. Locally, in Westchester, the article points to an attorney by the name of Linda Tirelli of White Plains as an advocate who is uncovering the sham procedures and bringing them to the courts’ attention. Ms Tirelli was also mentioned in Businessweek online last month on the very same subject.
The point here, as I have written many a time, is that this is not about invoking a technicality to get out of paying a debt. It is about due process. Many of these people are simply trying to sell their home, do a short sale, or modify their loan. They should be given ample time to do so and benefit from the laws of due process fought for by every veteran in this nation and revered by every conscientious person in the citizenry.
Anyone who has lost a home before they could sell (short sale or not) or modify, with any short cut or fraudulent procedure involved by the lender, is a victim of fraud. They are entitled to due process.
In 5 years you’ll see late night commercials for lawyers who will offer to sue for people who lost their homes in the robo signing scandal. It will become an industry. Forensic studies of trillions of pages of paperwork with be a growth sector for jobs. Buy stock in paper shredders*. For now, those who are fighting unfairly executed foreclosures deserve all the support they can get.
I do not give investment advice and no statement should be construed as advisement on investing in securities.
