Florida Is Still Letting Banks Break the Rules in Foreclosure Cases

By ABIGAIL FIELD

Over the holidays, I wrote about judges in Lee County, Fla., and how they appear to prioritize completing foreclosures over the rule of law. The most extreme example was an order in one case by Judge James R. Thompson that specifically exempted banks from a rule on affidavits that all other Florida litigants must follow — specifically, part (e), which requires claimants to provide legally valid documents to back up their claims.

Now, Judge Thompson has disowned the original order, replacing it with an order that claims banks do have to follow the rules. The problem? Even though he says the rules of evidence do apply to banks, the judge allowed the bank in that case to use an affidavit that obviously breaks the rule.

Apparently, the judge merely changed his public position: Rather than admit the fact that foreclosing banks don’t have to follow the rules on affidavits and loan documentation, he’ll say they do, then fail to make them comply. That smells like a cover-up, not a correction. Indeed, the clerk of the court told a Florida TV station that the court never makes the banks comply with the rules on documentation.

A Defense Against the Hazards of Robo-Signing

The rule at issue goes to the heart of the robo-signing crisis.

When a party in any kind of Florida lawsuit wants to submit an affidavit as evidence, rather than getting testimony from a witness, the rule requires the party to attach to it any documents the affiant (the person who’s swearing to the affidavit) reviewed in order to make the sworn statement. The attached documents give the court confidence that the affiant did in fact know that what he’s swearing is true, and they allow the other side a kind of “cross examination” of the affidavit.

See full article from DailyFinance: http://srph.it/gZS0DO

~

4closureFraud.org