Inspector General: FHFA Was Aware of Robo-Signing and Other Abuses

[chill_wind]

Inspector General: FHFA Was Aware of Robo-Signing and Other Abuses
10/04/2011 By: Carrie Bay

The Federal Housing Finance Agency (FHFA) had knowledge of such foreclosure procedural abuses as robo-signing and falsified documentation years before these infractions made front-page headlines and triggered industry-wide investigations, according to the agency’s own inspector general.

The Federal Housing Finance Agency Office of Inspector General (FHFA-OIG) focused its investigation on Fannie Mae’s Retained Attorney Network, which was established by the GSE in 1997 to perform default-related legal services associated with foreclosure, bankruptcy, loss mitigation, eviction, and REO closings.

According to the inspector general’s report released Tuesday, FHFA documented its receipt of consumer complaints citing “inappropriate foreclosure practices” involving Fannie Mae loans at least as early as August 2009.

However, FHFA did not act on these reports until a full year later, when allegations of abuse by law firms within Fannie Mae’s attorney network – such as routinely filing false documents in court proceedings and robo-signing – surfaced in the media in August of 2010.

More: http://www.dsnews.com/articles/index/inspector-general-says-fhfa-was-aware-of-robo-signing-and-other-abuses-2011-10-04

[elleng]

1. OMG

:wtf:
:puke: (FIRST TIME ever used <.)

[chill_wind]

9. elleng,

their knowledge of this appears to go as far back as 2003 at least-- page 13 of the IG report

:puke: is so right!

[OnyxCollie]

2. K&R. nt

[chill_wind]

3. And something else I was trying

to get noted yesterday-- re: HUD IG reports (BofA and Citi)

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=439x2059728

[woo me with science]

4. K&R nt

[Raster]

5. of course they were. Gotta make sure those banks can foreclose.

Who do they think the government agencies are there to protect: the citizens, or the banks that own the government?

Silly citizens. Rights are just for corporate persons.

[chill_wind]

6. NYT and IG Report

(pdf)
http://www.fhfaoig.gov/Content/Files/AUD-2011-004.pdf

Fannie Mae Knew Early of Abuses, Report Says
By GRETCHEN MORGENSON
October 3, 2011

Fannie Mae, the mortgage finance giant, learned as early as 2003 of extensive foreclosure abuses among the law firms it had hired to remove troubled borrowers from their homes. But the company did little to correct the firms’ practices, according to a report issued Tuesday.

Only after news reports in mid-2010 began to describe the dubious practices, like the routine filing of false pleadings in bankruptcy courts, did Fannie Mae’s overseer start to scrutinize the conduct. The report was critical of that overseer, the Federal Housing Finance Agency, and was prepared by the agency’s inspector general.

(snip)

The report is the second in two weeks in which the inspector general has outlined lapses at both the Federal Housing Finance Agency and the companies it oversees — Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac. The agency has acted as conservator for the companies since they were taken over by the government in 2008. Its duty is to ensure that their operations do not pose additional risk to the taxpayers who now own them. The companies have tapped the taxpayers to cover mortgage losses totaling about $160 billion.

Elijah E. Cummings, the Maryland Democrat who is the ranking member of the House Committee on Oversight and Government Reform and who requested the inspector general’s report, said in a statement, “As a member of Congress and an attorney, I find the systemic failures by F.H.F.A. and Fannie Mae to adequately oversee these foreclosure law firms to be a breach of the public trust and an assault on the integrity of our justice system.”

more: http://www.nytimes.com/2011/10/04/business/fannie-mae-ignored-foreclosure-misdeeds-report-says.html



:nuke: :nuke:

[Kaleko]

11. Wow. Since 2003...

[dixiegrrrrl]

13. Thank you for that.

adding to my growing stack of bookmarks on this topic.

Corruption seems to be the norm now, far and wide and deep.

[slipslidingaway]

7. knr nt

[slipslidingaway]

8. Whistleblower Lawsuit Takes on Banks Nationwide That Cheated Taxpayers, Veterans Out of Hundreds of

Millions of Dollars

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_mesg&forum=439&topic_id=2066296&mesg_id=2066296

[chill_wind]

10. Yes

:-(

http://www.sacbee.com/2011/10/04/3960157/whistleblower-lawsuit-takes-on.html

(I think your DU link goes to an Afghanistan thread, but this is the story you mean?)

[slipslidingaway]

16. Yes it is, thanks for catching that and adding the correct link. n/t

[Aerows]

12. There's a shock

The whole system was corrupt to the core and a money grab by all parties involved at the top (and the middle in some cases).

You'd almost think something like that would eventually collapse under the weight of it's own corr... Oh wait.

This is why many many people are worried about another financial meltdown. Anytime you let a system get so far out of hand with it's own corruption, incestuous relationships with auditors and regulators (they people who are supposed to be watching them), and a justice system that refuses to prosecute them, it's a recipe for disaster. You need look no further than the 1920's, and the Great Depression to see what we are going to continue to experience until we get serious about regulation and most importantly, PROSECUTING and INCARCERATING the law breakers. Fining doesn't work. Throwing them in the can for several years does work, and deters others from doing it.

[chill_wind]

14. +1000

[ms.smiler]

15. Unfortunately, our government is working in concert with the banks

to enable this massive fraud. I suspect the FHFA will do its best to paper over problems at the same time that a fine attorney and 300 homeowners in PA and NJ are working hard to blow the lid off the securitized mortgage scam.

Fannie is a shareholder in MERSCORP, Inc. The “robo-signers” are all supposed MERS Vice Presidents and Assistant Secretaries.

If I know, and my attorney knows, that MERS has never legally created any Vice Presidents and Assistant Secretaries in accordance with Delaware state law, how can Fannie, or Freddie or the FHFA not know?

All the MERS Assignments of Mortgage, Satisfactions of Mortgage and Affidavits are invalid and fraudulent. Those documents cloud the Titles of millions of properties.

This is what results from privatized land records, (MERS.)


300 Quiet Title actions were filed in PA & NJ challenging the authority of the supposed MERS officers who signed MERS documents. Only 1% of the Complaints were Answered. 99% of the homeowners won by default. My own Complaint is among the 1% and is the case closest to trial.

I love fighting banksters. :patriot:

[Kaleko]

17. A special recommendation for your post, ms.smiler.

Keep up the good fight.

[me b zola]

18. K&R

:grr: