In response to reports that Bank of America plans to restart foreclosures on borrowers in 23 states where issues of possibly fraudulent documentation have been raised, Ohio Attorney General Richard Cordray has offered the following statement: "While I would not presume to speak for all 50 state attorneys general, from my own standpoint, we will want to be very careful in reviewing whatever their revised process purports to be. I would caution that they still have significant financial exposure in many, many cases if they are now acknowledging that the evidence that they previously submitted to the courts was fraudulent.
"Those previous submissions remain subject to possible sanctions and penalties by the courts and so Bank of America would be well-advised to consider aggressively pursuing loan modifications as a means of resolving those cases by agreement rather than pushing toward a court order that may involve sanctions and penalties for their prior misconduct.
"You have to remember, these are the same people who have essentially acknowledged that they committed fraud in perhaps tens of thousands of cases. Now they tell us that they have fixed the problem in a matter of weeks. We are certainly not just going to take their word for it."
Cordray filed a lawsuit against GMAC Mortgage/Ally Financial Inc. on Oct. 6, becoming the first attorney general in the nation to take legal action to confront the emerging "robo-signing" problem in home foreclosures. A week later, the attorneys general from all 50 states joined together in announcing a multi-state coordinated investigation of the mortgage industry over the faulty affidavits.
For more information, visit www.OhioAttorneyGeneral.gov.
