Editor’s note: This article was first published in December 2011 as news about a lawsuit that had just been filed; the outcome is not covered, and Occupy Wall Street is described as it stood then.
Massachusetts Attorney General Martha Coakley has filed a lawsuit against Bank of America, JP Morgan, Citi, Wells Fargo and GMAC over “allegedly” illegal foreclosures, as well as deceptive loan servicing.
The complaint includes mortgage fraud and improper handling of property foreclosures, forged documents, foreclosure orders signed by people of doubtful authority, and deceptive practices related to loan modifications.
This lawsuit could become a benchmark for later suits elsewhere in the world, because the method used by the 5 largest US banks may well be the same one other banks in other countries are using to cope with the crisis in the real estate business, where they need quick foreclosures that the person supposedly responsible for authorising them rarely even reads.
It is also “the last straw” in a country where the Occupy Wall Street movement is gaining far more strength than it had a few months ago.
“Those who broke the rules in the past and caused the current crisis are trying to save their own necks again with new illegal practices.”
Featured image: Office of the Attorney General of Massachusetts, Public domain, via Wikimedia Commons.
