CitiMortgage, Inc., Plaintiff,
against
Angela Nunez, et. al., Defendant.
In this foreclosure action, plaintiff, CITMORTGAGE, INC. (CITI), moved for summary judgment and an order of reference for the premises located at 38 Norwood Avenue, Brooklyn, New York (Block 3905, Lot 28, County of Kings). On October 25, 2010, the case was on my motion calendar for oral arguments. The matter was adjourned, pursuant to a short form order, on consent to today. Plaintiff CITI’s counsel agreed to file the affirmation required by the Chief Administrative Judge for foreclosure cases, as per the October 20, 2010 Administrative Order. Plaintiff’s counsel informed the Court, today, that he did not have the affirmation because CITI did not have in place, prior to November 8, 2010, procedures to comply with the Administrative Order of Chief Administrative Judge Ann T. Pfau. The Court does not work for CITI and cannot wait for CITI, a multi-billion dollar financial behemoth to get its “act” together. [*2]
Therefore, to prevent the waste of judicial resources, the instant foreclosure action is dismissed without prejudice. If plaintiff chooses to move to restore the instant action and motion, plaintiff’s counsel must comply with the new Rule, promulgated by the Chief Administrative Judge on October 20, 2010, requiring an affirmation by plaintiff’s counsel that he communicated on a specific date with a named representative or representatives of plaintiff CITI, who informed him that he or she:
(a) has personally reviewed plaintiff’s documents and records relating
to this case for factual accuracy; and (b) confirmed the factual
accuracy of the allegations set forth in the Complaint and any
supporting affirmations filed with the Court as well as the accuracy
of the notarizations contained in the supporting documents filed
therewith.
Further, plaintiff’s counsel, based upon his or her communication with plaintiff’s representative or representatives, “as well as upon my own inspection and reasonable inquiry under the circumstances, . . . affirm that, to the best of my knowledge, information, and belief, the Summons, Complaint and other papers filed or submitted to the Court in this matter contain no false statements of fact or law.”
Conclusion
Accordingly, it is
ORDERED, that the instant motion of plaintiff CITIMORTGAGE, INC. for summary judgment and an order of reference for the premises at 38 Norwood Avenue, Brooklyn, New [*4]York (Block 3905, Lot 28, County of Kings) is denied; and it is further
ORDERED, that the instant action, Index Number 2558/09, is dismissed without prejudice; and it is further
ORDERED, that the notice of pendency in the instant action, filed with the Kings County Clerk on February 2, 2009, by plaintiff, CITIMORTGAGE, INC., to foreclose a mortgage for real property located at 38 Norwood Avenue, Brooklyn, New York (Block 3905, Lot 28, County of Kings), is cancelled; and it is further
ORDERED, that if plaintiff, CITIMORTGAGE, INC., moves to restore the instant foreclosure action and motion for an order of reference for real property located at 38 Norwood Avenue, Brooklyn, New York (Block 3905, Lot 28, County of Kings), counsel for plaintiff must comply with the new Court filing requirement, announced by Chief Judge Jonathan Lippman on October 20, 2010, and ordered by Chief Administrative Judge Ann T. Pfau on October 20, 2010, by submitting an affirmation, using the new standard Court form, pursuant to CPLR Rule 2106 and under the penalties of perjury, that counsel for plaintiff, CITIMORTGAGE, INC.: has “based upon my communications [with named representative or representatives of plaintiff], as well as upon my own inspection and reasonable inquiry under the circumstances, . . .that, to the best of my knowledge, information, and belief, the Summons, Complaint and other papers filed or submitted to the Court in this matter contain no false statements of fact or law”; and, is “aware of my obligations under New York Rules of Professional Conduct (22 NYCRR Part 1200) and 22 NYCRR Part 130.”
This constitutes the Decision and Order of the Court.
ENTER
________________________________HON. ARTHUR M. SCHACK
J.S.C.
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4closureFraud.org
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CitiMortgage, Inc., Plaintiff, against Angela Nunez, et. al., Defendant.
This is tremendous. I commend judge Shack for upholding Justice in his jurisdiction. I wish Virginia judges can follow his example.
Here’s how I am going about it in my pro se case. Point it out to them and the State Attorney. Below is my email to the attorney from Marshall Watson handling my case….
Info for your Marshall Watson case #09-04627, Monroe County Clerk # 2009-CA-471-K
Mr. Newman,
Please see the attached. I noticed that you have filed a notice of appearance regarding the fact that you are now the attorney handling this case, although you and your firm failed to respond to my previous emails and phone calls requesting such information.
For that reason I wanted to make sure you had the attached documents in regards to the upcoming hearing scheduled for Jan 7 at 3:30 PM before the honorable Judge Taylor here in Key West.
Please also take note that I feel I have illustrated the documents your firm has filed are fraudulent. You may disagree, but however through these filings you do now have knowledge of this fact. Should you, or any of the other individuals continue to pursue this case or counter my pleadings, I think it illustrates an intent to defraud with the use of these documents.
For that reason, I have also CC’ed Investigator Jeff Schocket and State Attorney Dennis Ward of the 16th Judicial Circuit, both of whom I have discussed this case with in great detail. As I have mentioned before in communications with your firm, I am interested in ensuring that any criminal activity that may have or potentially will occur be pursued to the fullest extent possible.
If you would have the courtesy, please respond to this email to let me know that you have received it. I highly doubt you will, so for that reason I have also emailed william.newman@marshallwatson.com to illustrate that non existent accounts receive non-deliverable messages from your email server.
I have also included past attorneys handling the case as well as other employees of Marshall Watson whom have signed some of the potentially fraudulent documents such as Ms. Arango, and Ms. Anderson. For some reason email to Ms. Arango, whom Ms. Anderson attests to working at MERS, never gets through when I email her up there in Reston. Odd that fact, no?
Regardless, have a great holiday season, I look forward to seeing you on January 7.
Peace on earth to men of good will.
—
Matt Gardi
PS – I did also CC a few members of the media, hope you don’t mind… 🙂
MER’S is a joke!! Mortgage Electronic Registery System (MER’S)….They are a shell company for the banks. There are no real employee’s. They destroy documents and use robo-signers to sign falsified documents. In other words rubber stamps. Any bank can sign up for MER’S and register a VP. The real doucments are destryed and one knows or can tell you who owns the loan or whom owed the loan. They are known as a “forecloser Mill”.
“MERS is a confidential electronic registry that banks created in 1997 to more efficiently “track” mortgage paperwork. It saved banks time and money by cutting down the paper shuffle and helping banks avoid paying recording fees to government recorders, who traditionally kept track of mortgage sales. The increased convenience for the banks helped enable securitization of mortgages”.
Read this article. http://www.propublica.org/blog/item/whos-who-in-the-foreclosure-scandal-a-primer-on-the-players this is where I copied the paragraph above from.
“when you assume, you make an ass out of “U” and me” looks like NYS is not taking the it anymore! Some people , including this Judge prefer to put their head on the pillow at night with a clear heart.
@ pparke500
I don’t know that a new rule, or modification of an old one, was required. I believe consistent application of the old or prior rule would have gotten the point across quite well. The ethical canons typically require due diligence, candor to the tribunal, etc. Thus knowing what is presented to the court is factual and true has always been required.
But I don’t mean to be argumentative. I too am glad some courts are taking steps to rein in these criminal thugs that happen to have BAR cards.
The New York rule makes it clear judges, truth and the law are in charge in New York courts.
Convenient fabrications and falsehoods will get a lawyer disbarred at the least.
When they sign off on it, their feeling about what’s in the cases they’re presenting are very different. Again, this is why foreclosures have dropped off so sharply in the state versus others. There have been faulty documents. With the affirmation, the lawyers are basically putting their reputations on the line. A faulty document isn’t worth ending up working beside someone in McDonald’s that you were trying to foreclose on.
The purpose of that affirmation is to put the lawyer’s license on the line by making him swear that he has done due diligence WHICH HE IS REQUIRE TO DO ANYWAY. The fact that courts, incl. here in Fl, have had to pass a rule to make lawyers tell the truth is despicable.
IndyMac v Yano-Horoski. The bank successfully appealed because it didn’t know how extensively it could get punished for fraudulent paperwork. This time? Citi was clearly warned. If it happens again, Citi and its lawyers have no excuse for penalties that may occur.
Which is really why foreclosures are so dramatically off from last year and even last month. Being caught committing fraud.