GMAC Mortgage is taking the eye-opening step of stopping evictions in 23 states because the affidavits used to support the kickouts contained information the employees didn’t themselves personally know to be true, and they were sometimes signed without a notary present, according to a company statement.
The company described the error as “technical” and said there were no problems with the underlying basis for the loan or the eviction.
Back in ’09, a deposed GMAC Mortgage employee said this his group of 13 people signed around 10,000 affidavits a month without checking their accuracy, as is required, instead depending on the law firms that were sending the affidavits for verification. It seems banks are catching wise that they can’t submit fraudulent documents to the courts anymore.
Ally Says GMAC Mortgage Mishandled Affidavits on Foreclosures [Bloomberg]
PREVIOUSLY
GMAC Halts Evictions In 23 States
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Wonder if there’s any link with http://consumerist.com/2010/09/gmac-halts-evictions-in-23-states.html
yeah this is the followup, I’m interested as to how much deeper this goes
Look under the ‘previously’ section above. It’s an update to the same story. Would be nice if they made it a bit clearer though.
“There was never any intent on the part of GMAC Mortgage to bypass court rules or procedures. Nor do these failures reflect any disrespect for our courts or the judicial processes.â€
Everyone is always like “it doesn’t matter if you didn’t intend to brake the rules” You broke the rules, and should be slapped with whatever penalties that would due to a average person who isn’t a multi-million/billion dollar corporation.
Saying oh the lawyers are covering it doesn’t cut it. The lawyers and accountants were “covering it @ Enron” and look where that left us.
It doesn’t just not cut it, the lawyers probably knew better than to sign anything. The GMAC employees are the ones who signed the affidavits, and so they are the ones attesting to the truth of what the affidavit says.
Exactly. The corporation has a paper trail of who exactly signed what, and if the unchecked claim is provably false, the court will know exactly what individual did it. Why does “under penalty of perjury” only apply to individuals who don’t work for corporations?
it doesn’t matter if you didn’t intend to brake the rules
Intent does matter. It’s the difference between fraud and an error. If Company A mistakenly books $100 million in revenue due to a legitimate misunderstanding of accounting rules, its an error. If the CEO is telling people to create false documents to make it look like they sold an extra $100 in software, its fraud. True, there may be penalties/fines under both circumstances, but they’re most likely going to be less if its an error rather than fraud.
And so! They have found “a mouse” in their documentation set.
But as everyone knows, there is never just one mouse.
So…I wonder what else they got wrong.
Heh, it’s like what they also say about cockroaches- when you can see one, there are 10 more that can see you.
This doesn’t happen in nearly half the states in the union without “problems with the underlying basis for the loan or the eviction.” I mean, if these were all legit, why the rush job? Even a greedy person would know that filing documents correctly is going to be better in the long run, even if it takes a bit more time. My spidey-senses are tingling, I can’t help but think there’s more to it.
Is it just me, or is this entire posting (and comments) centered???
Ha, I was just thinking the same thing myself. Thought I was going bonkers for a minute. They must of miscoded the page or decided to shake things up a bit
It is haiku time
The formatting is messed up
Good for poetry
My mom used to work as a mortgage fraud investigator with a big time title company. She would tell me about how the banks would try to foreclose on people when they had no legal standing to (the people were paying the bills or they worked out a mortgage modification plan). My guess is that the title companies involved were getting word of the foreclosures and started to ring their bell about it.
It is not a “technical” error to swear under oath that you know X to be true, when in fact you have no idea that X is true, but you’re assuming it’s true because the company’s lawyers check it. At least, they probably did. I mean, hey, it’s not like they might be running a foreclosure mill where their people are doing the same file-and-forget method without checking. Right?
Seriously, the people who signed these things should be investigated for perjury.
I’d be adding fraud to that charge sheet. May not fly, but it will get their attention. Perjury is an indivdual charge – fraud can be charge to the individual and the corporation.