Sacramento, CA - --California's Attorney General (AG) Edmund G. Brown Jr. today filed a $60 million lawsuit against US Loan Auditors, My US Legal Services, the three owners: attorney and real estate broker James Sandison, Jeffrey Pulvino, and Shane Barker, as well as two California attorneys, Sharon L. Lapin and Jonathan G. Stein, who lured desperate homeowners with a deceptive marketing scheme that promised to obtain mortgage modifications through the use of computer-generated "forensic loan audits." The suit demands civil penalties, restitution for victims, and permanent injunctions to keep the companies and other defendants from fraudulently marketing forensic loan audits and legal services of little value.
The companies, based in Rancho Cordova, work together to market and sell "forensic loan audits" to homeowners, who pay thousands of dollars in up-front fees for a dubious computer-generated review of their mortgages. The audits purport to show violations of law by lenders, which sales agents cite to convince homeowners they have a strong legal case. Sales agents use these findings to encourage homeowners to stop making their mortgage payments and instead pay additional fees to bring "predatory lending" lawsuits against their lenders, according to the AG.
Both companies deceive homeowners by assuring them that filing these lawsuits will give them "legal leverage" to obtain a loan modification and prevent lenders from foreclosing or collecting monthly mortgage payments. Homeowners who filed these lawsuits have lost thousands of dollars and placed themselves in greater danger of losing their homes.
My US Legal Services bilks clients for months, filing cookie-cutter complaints with little or no merit, billing unjustified monthly fees, and then dodging clients' phone calls or stringing them along with false assurances that a settlement is in progress.
Hundreds of California homeowners, many of them facing possible loss of their homes, have been duped into paying thousands of dollars to the two companies -- one homeowner paid more than $55,000 -- but received little or no relief.
Meanwhile, the litigation mill run by My US Legal Services has littered courts with hundreds of lawsuits that have scant chance of success. Two federal judges have expressed concern about the legitimacy of these lawsuits and have several times sanctioned attorneys involved.
If you are a homeowner who has been scammed, you can file a complaint online with the Attorney General's office at: www.ag.ca.gov/consumers/general.php. If you have a complaint against Sandison, Lapin, Stein or any other lawyer involved in a loan modification or foreclosure relief service, contact the State Bar Complaint Hotline at 1-800-843-9053. Complaint forms and an explanation of the attorney discipline system are available online at: www.calbar.ca.gov.
No comments:
Post a Comment