In 2010, the Law Offices of David J. Stern spun off the robo signing document mill part of his business into a separate, publicly traded company.
Stern pocketed some $60 million from that deal. The investors got the company and all its documents, internal procedures and everything you would need in order to find out what really happened within the Stern document mill.
A little after 8 AM EST today, a filing went up on the SEC’s Edgar database. It’s a Complaint in lawsuit, dated yesterday.
The lawsuit is by the investors suing Stern for lying to them about the activities of the document mill and misleading them into believing they were buying a legitimate business instead of a criminal enterprise. Unlike a regular plaintiff or an Attorney General who is dependent on obtaining documents and information FROM the target of their ire via discovery of subpoena or search warrant, these plaintiffs apparently have all the info they need already in hand, because they bought the company.
Let me give a quote or two from the Complaint to show what they found in the books and records of the Stern foreclosure mill.
32. The Seller Defendants’ fraudulent and illegal foreclosure practices prior to the Transaction, and the subsequent demise of the Seller Defendants’ law practice, have now been well documented and reported upon in the local and national media.
33. Prior to the Transaction, the Seller Defendants were at all times well aware that DS Law and the Target Business were intentionally perpetuating a fraud on the courts by, inter alia, systematically filing forged documents, forging signatures on such documents, fraudulently backdating documents, improperly notarizing and witnessing documents, fabricating documents, signing affidavits without reviewing or verifying the information contained therein, prosecuting foreclosure cases without obtaining proper service of process, and filing foreclosures with inaccurate and/or incomplete documents.
34. Indeed, the Seller Defendants directed employees of DS Law and the Target Business to purposefully overlook glaring inaccuracies in foreclosure pleadings and to essentially rubber stamp computer generated documents without reviewing or verifying the accuracy of the documents. New attorneys at DS Law were not only encouraged, but were even ordered to sign legal filings and pleadings without reading them. As a result, false and inaccurate documents were routinely executed and filed with the courts in an effort to hasten foreclosure proceedings and illegally obtain final judgments of foreclosure for the Seller Defendants’ clients.
This is an explosive document, because the plaintiffs here are like insider whistleblowers; they know what’s in the files, because they have the files. This is a godsend for homeowners who have been victims of foreclosure fraud. It should dramatically increase the pressure for criminal prosecution. More to the point, judges with robo signed documents in front of them will be even more concerned about granting foreclosure judgments; at least they will be when the news about this gets widely reported. Huge hat tip to Florida foreclosure defense guru Lynn Szymoniak who emailed me the Edgar link early this morning while the electrons where still warm.
Folks, please tweet, forward, whatever. This is a huge story that deserves to be given major coverage in MSM. Local judges need to be aware that they are being handed forged documents.



39 Comments

The arrogance of Stern is breathtaking, if he sold the document mill AS IS, with all its contents intact, and assumed that the buyers wouldn’t go after him after they actually read through the docs to see precisely what they bought.
Stunning.
Rec’d.
I hope this makes the front page at FDL as well as MyFDL.
If stern were wise, he’d either be trying to buy silence or moving out of the courts jurisdiction.
Boxturtle (This one may be to expensive for him to buy out of)
Well, to be fair, he probably thinks it’s all good and the investors would be happy with the way the business was being run.
After all they just want the money, right?
People like that, who have no moral compass, don’t understand “what the big deal is” when you point out their ethical failures. They don’t even understand what you’re talking about.
I have been in business with people like this before, sadly. You end up losing your shirt trying to do the right thing and they end up getting off scott free and never losing even a wink of sleep over what they’ve done.
“People like that, who have no moral compass, don’t understand “what the big deal is” when you point out their ethical failures. They don’t even understand what you’re talking about.”
That about sums up most people in Washington, Wall Street and the Health Kill Industry.
Question – Why hasn’t Sterns been arrested? This fraud is clearly criminal and the evidence is both undeniable and public.
Why are we seeing a civil suit before seeing criminal charges?
My company was bought last year by another entity and I witnessed first hand the audits and processes that were undertaken. Before going public all of this information would’ve been heavily scrutinized by an auditor. That this information was allowed to exist without being destroyed is simply mind-boggling.
rec’d & fwd’d.
Thank you!i
It appears to me that whoever bought the company is attempting to shield themselves from being sued by people who were the victims of these practices.
I wonder how much of the upper level of management responsible for overseeing the day to day practices carried over from one incarnation into the next one?
I also wonder about issues of personal responsibility. It says that new attorneys were “forced” to make false representations to the courts that they had read and reviewed the filings. Sorry. No one forces anyone, let alone someone who is supposed to be an officer of the court to perjure themselves. Once the new attorneys discovered the illegal and unethical business practices, they had the choice of standing up and saying, “I’m out of here and I will be filing paperwork with the local state and national Bar Associations and I will also be filing affidavits on behalf of the defendants in these actions.” How many do you suppose did that?
It sums up who the 1% & their enablers & hangers-on & wannabes & supporters & groupies are, which ends up being a rather significant portion of the populace. Another significant portion of the populace simply doesn’t care and/or can’t be bothered to know about any of this criminal behavor.
And that’s why/how it goes on and on and on… and will continue to do so.
As nation, we talk endlessly about “family values” and “morals,” but talk is very very very very cheap. Money TALKS; values walk far far away.
The force they are referring is that they would be denied the lucrative paychecks if they did not play along with the fraud.
LOL. I mean, it is funny, but notverymuchso. Yeah, guns to their heads while their hands were on the Bible.
Thanks, Cynthia, excellent, as always.
Why? Atty General Eric Holder and his boss.
I bet you couldn’t get a pubic comment out of either of them on why.
Boxturtle (And they’ll go to a lot of trouble to make sure they are never in a position to be asked)
I would like the answer to that qusetion.
First of all, the Complaint with all the smoking gun admission is only dated YESTERDAY, so even an agressive prosecutor needs time to read it and do some follow up.
But, I can’t see how you could avoid the blush test if you don’t prosecute. The Fla. AG has GJ testimony that it has put out that documents the process service fraud an some of the other frauds mentioned elsewhere in the Complaint that I have quoted from.
Soooo, maybe Fla AG now has all the ammo it needs?
“It appears to me that whoever bought the company is attempting to shield themselves from being sued by people who were the victims of these practices”
Oh, for sure this civil suit is defensive. I can only imagine the giant tsunami of class actions coming towards the new owners.
But what gets me is the tactic they have chosen, exposing the corruption instead of trying to conitue the cover up.
They only bought the comapany in 2010, they have brought suit within a reasonable season to perhaps be able to establish that they are victims too.
They investors paid a lot of $ and appear to have been swindled themselves.
The important part is–they have made binding admissions that cofirm what homeowners and consumer advocates have long been saying AND they will have the paperwork in hand to prove those admissions.
Not for nuthin’ but in addition to the other bad karma, it appears that Stern was not an overly generous boss and his employees did not make very much.
I assume, without actually knowing–so maybe I guess is more accurate–that he hired people who did not have many other employment options?
So instead of pointing this out the New York Times, in all its glory, drags the red herring that retired Gen. Wesley Clark was one of the investors into the story.
No wonder the public doesn’t know what’s been going on.
Gotta know what’s really important, TD. Like, was Clark wearing underwear at the time?
Correct link to the complaint is:
http://www.sec.gov/Archives/edgar/data/1436612/000114420412000329/v244554_ex99-1.htm
Ahhh, key is; Florida.
The AG here had the court rule against her when she refused to return a Katrina victims dog!
This is a very very corrupt system here. Look at two of our past Govs: Jeb Bush and Rick Scott.
We’ll have to look elsewhere for any action against a 1%er.
Pardon the stupid question… there’s not any connection in any way to NBA Commissioner/lawyer David J. Stern?
I double-checked his name at the NBA website just to make sure. It is.
http://www.nba.com/careers/executives/stern.html
I’ve thought the NBA’s David J. Stern is a crook for a while but prevailing wisdom is NBA Stern is smart enough not to get caught.
Background on how Stern was able to fob off DJSP without its investors knowing in advance that they were buying a pig in a poke is here:
Much more in the article. It was a bait-and-switch. The investors thought they were investing in a Chinese business enterprise!
Cynic in me says nothing will happen.
He’s got at least 60 million dollars. At least!
How many judges, lawyers, and politicians does that buy these days?
Bondi in Fl.? Does anyone expect her to do anything?
The SEC? LMAO.
Miniscule fine, and no indictments in 5, 4, 3, 2, …
This isn’t the only firm. GMAC had a firm in st Louis MO. who handled foreclosures. The guy wouldn’t answer the phone or give me a pay off number, despite my leaving a message every day for several weeks. I always wondered about the license of the lawyers involved. The foreclosure originated in TX, but the lawyer was in Mo. I live in NE. Anyway, this isn’t the only one. This was happening in most of these subprime loans…it just whether or not the other ones will be caught.
This is great news though!!
Amazing article. Very very dumb investment given the particulars. Like buying a restaurant with only a single customer. Hard to see what was in it for the investors in the first place, given the sweetheart terms for the previous owner.
This is going to be a perfect storm of all the too clever by half MOTU turning on each other.
So, this is a leading case for the big boys who need to know what they still need to shred, right?
Isn’t this only going to be limited to Florida foreclosures? Did Stern have dealings in any other states?
I know GMAC is using a local Chicago area law firm to sign off on MERS assignments giving them back the loans in order to go after the homeowners with foreclosure. We had an anti-foreclosure meeting here last night and I would love to know how to investigate and prove the crimininality myself, but need someone to talk me through how to do it.
It’s amazing how as long as the money kept flowing in DJSP remained ignorant of the fraud.(h/t Apikoros for the link) The deal was closed in January 15, 2010 and it only took them two years to discover the fraud.
It seems when the revenue stream stopped is when the sh^t hit the fan. as per the complaint filed:
If the money kept flowing in I don’t think we would have ever heard of this.
Hang the bastards by their ball-sacks with piano-wire.
This stuff has been going on since at least 2001…and probably since 1999.
There is so much illegal behavior that it still literally floors me that it’s not all out of the table. It clearly is trickling out. The one I am waiting for is the “foreclosure help” companies.
The scheme her was that GMAC would not answer calls, fax’s nothing once you were in foreclosure. The would minimally meet the TILA law by sending you a letter once a month telling you to call them. I would call and be sent to a voice mail. YOU can’t speak to anyone without your account number, social or by identifying your phone number. They would never return your call. So, if you wanted the pay off figures…which I asked for every day for weeks, they would not tell you.
This went on for months. I went to lawyer after lawyer and eventually my pay off and foreclosure sale date showed up in the info that a bankruptcy lawyer ran. It was a month from the sale date. I was in panic about when they would sell it, cause they would not answer my calls. Nor would the lawyer handling my foreclosure for GMAC. (I got that number through the bankruptcy lawyer). At any rate, I googled for help and found countless foreclosure help companies. They seemed so legit. I knew in the back of my mind that these banks were violating the law by not answering my calls, so I knew these companies were bogus, but I was desperate. I called and they were sooooo nice. For the first time they validated how mean GMAC is, and that their company is one of the few successful with dealing with them. It cost 1500 to have them negotiate a loan for the amount I owed (this is now a week before my foreclosure sale date). The new interest rate was 23%, to be applied on top of my regular house payment. Not help…not really but it bought me time.
Anyway…these companies were likely owned and run by the mortgage companies. As were the fly by night companies…saying “I buy foreclosed homes”. This was likely all part of the same fraud.
I am waiting to see proof of this.
23% interest rate is a Mortgage Mod? WTF?
I sure hope someone confronts Obama on the campaign trail with what he said about them not breaking any laws and now this comes up and where is the perp walk?
Great new angle, I mean, new for me, wavpeac. Of COURSE there was another (and another and another) company set up to take advantage. We need more of your info on these matters. Thanks for this.
DAYAM.
This is sure interesting news. Wonder if anything will happen? I will certainly try to repeat it to my network, such as it is.
Florida. Prosecutions? I no longer make predictions about anything, but still really appreciate your keeping us up-to-date.
The MSM sure don’t care any more. It’s and election year! Yea! Cue the horse races!
Important issues coverage? not so much.
.
Today on our [feeble] local radio, home of every time-waster ever produced by “the Ad Council,” I heard a “public service ad” that started off with Eric Holder. He was “cautioning” folks not to buy counterfeit purses or illegal downloads, because the proceeds just went to “gangs.”
He droned on, completely without irony vis-a-vis the financial illegalities he’s declined to prosecute.
“This is going to be a perfect storm of all the too clever by half MOTU turning on each other.”
This has been one of my guilty pleasures. I have warned some of the lower 1%ers I have known that the people above them will eat their lunch sooner or later too, slyly leading them to go on record that that is never going to happen (letting them pretend they are superior to those of us that get laid off).
I can be a real bastard, as most of them are now out of work with no real marketable skills. I just always have a big grin on my face when I talk to them.
I love never having to say “I told you so” while still rubbing it in.
I promise you, that millions of people lost their homes to fraud.
Escrow account manipulations,
forced insurance
refusal to answer phone calls or give pay offs while in foreclosure (Tila)
refusing to give payment history (respa violation)
In the end there will be RICO violations…These banks were all treating the sub prime lender EXACTLY the same way. That meant there was no where to go. And no credibility.
I have been waiting for 10 years for these violations to make the light of day.
There had a multitude of tricks that would force you into foreclosure. Some folks were completely ignorant of their rights. Some of us knew but couldn’t get legal help. A.G’s were targeting only the small crop up banks but leaving the big ones alone.