[Peace-discuss] Fw: Call Lisa Madigan's office this week about mortgage fraud and the foreclosure crisis

[David Johnson]

----- Original Message ----- 
From: Mary Shesgreen 
To: dlj725 at hughes.net 
Sent: Monday, December 26, 2011 12:00 PM
Subject: Call Lisa Madigan's office this week about mortgage fraud and the foreclosure crisis






 Dear NIJwJ members and friends,




Please Call Lisa Madigan's office  312-814-3000 about mortgage fraud and the foreclosure crisis, again, even if you have called before.  We fear that proposed settlement, giving the banks immunity from prosecution may happen before Dec 31st, and that Lisa Madigan may go along with it.  Below is a sample script and background information.







Sample Script:  My name is _________________.  I live in ____________, Illinois .  I am calling to ask Lisa Madigan to aggressively investigate the big banks for possible fraud and other criminal behavior in their mortgage practices.  I oppose any settlement which gives the banks immunity from prosecution for robo-signing or any other fraudulent  mortgage practices and I ask Lisa Madigan to publicly reject  any such settlement.

A handful of brave attorneys general have vowed to stand up to the banks and hold them accountable. But federal regulators, the Obama administration and a large number of state attorneys general led by Iowa Attorney General Tom Miller are trying to settle with some of the biggest banks. 

In exchange for what amounts to a slap on the wrist, the banks will get broad immunity from future prosecution.1 

I am asking today for Lisa Madigan to publically reject that plan.    Such a plan would indicate that the banks are too big to prosecute just as they were once too big to fail.  



So,  Please tell me  Yes or No: will Lisa Madigan publically reject the proposed sweetheart deal for the banks?





The following back ground information comes from the Credo action alert on this same topic.  You can use it if appropriate in your conversation with Lisa Madigan's office..

The notorious robo-signing scandal is just the tip of the iceberg when it comes to wrongdoing by the mortgage industry. 

Through congressional hearings, court cases and investigative reporting, we know of numerous stories of big financial firms engaging in shady mortgage practices, many of which seem on their face to violate various laws and regulations. 

But there has been a big push to reach a settlement before these issues have been investigated in any meaningful way. 

The terms of the settlement are supposedly neither public nor final, but what has leaked to the press shows an utter unwillingness to contemplate real penalties for criminal activity. 

What's more, a settlement could short-circuit future attempts to get to the bottom of this sordid mess, punish people for their wrongdoings, and force banks to change their practices to help borrowers and homeowners. 

As Illinois 's top law enforcement official, Attorney General Madigan should aggressively push for thorough investigations, meaningful penalties and real accountability. But that can't happen if Attorney General Madigan agrees to a broad settlement that lets Wall Street crooks off the hook and gives them broad immunity from future prosecution. 

Sadly, the federal government thus far has largely given Wall Street a free pass on its criminal behavior. But there's a widespread understanding that there's something deeply wrong with that, not just on a moral level but also in terms of what it means to our democracy. 

It's clear that what motivates and animates the Occupy Wall Street protests currently happening is a deep sense that our financial elites wield too much power over our lives yet escape accountability even when they cause a great deal of suffering. 

Fortunately, there are mechanisms for accountability besides what exists at the federal level. The big banks appear to have violated state laws, so state attorneys general are in a prime position to stand up to Wall Street. 

In fact, a small but growing number of state attorneys general have vowed to aggressively investigate them. Eric Schneiderman of New York and Beau Biden of Delaware have led the way on this, but have been joined by the attorneys general from Nevada, Minnesota, Kentucky and, as of last week, California. 

The recent addition of California to this list may have finally stopped the federal government from being able to push through a truly national settlement. But the Obama administration can exert considerable pressure on individual attorneys general to cut a deal. 

We need to prevent attorneys general from striking a deal before meaningful investigations are complete. The more we find out, the worse Wall Street looks and the harder it will be for their crimes to be swept underneath the carpet. 

>From our success in other states, we know that attorneys general are largely unused to sizable amounts of direct public lobbying. If we can make this a big enough issue, we can get more of them on our side. And the first step in that is public commitments to fully and aggressively investigate Wall Street crooks. 

1. "Surprise! Securitization Liability Release Part of Foreclosure Fraud Settlement," David Dayen, FDL News, 09-06-2011. 





Some additional factual background supplied by Toni Boughner




--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

I don't recall if these are mentioned in the bullet point section, but they would seem to be good addtions if not:

Nevada's AG sued BofA over the 2009 Countrywide settlement because they weren't following the requirements set out in the settlement. Illinois was party to that and it would be good to know where AG Madigan stands on it. I haven't seen anything about it, but maybe somebody else has - or it's a good question to ask.


This came out today, and while the majority of the story is regarding AG Coakley's stance on Occupy Boston, toward the end this is a nice little gem that can be turned around to pressure AG Madigan as to why she is not announcing her intention to do the same for the people of Illinois:

"The country has been "turned upside-down by this mortgage crisis," Coakley said, and her office is planning to take aim at bad mortgages by pursuing litigation against unlawful mortgage agreements and foreclosures.

“I am convinced if we do not stop this wave of foreclosures and get back to a healthy real estate market, we are not going to turn this economy around.”

Coakley's office is looking into several avenues of litigation, specifically naming the Mortgage Electronic Registration System as a possible target.

"We think they cut corners," Coakley said.

She called on federal government to take action against mortgages that are unfair to homeowners.

“I feel pretty strongly that something has to happen at the federal level," Coakley said. "We’ve been doing what we can at the state level, the federal government has to take some action particularly getting at some of this mortgage unfairness.”"

http://backbay.patch.com/articles/coakley-on-occupy-boston-properly-channeled-frustration-ac55a9bf

-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: <http://lists.chambana.net/pipermail/peace-discuss/attachments/20111226/19190a1e/attachment.html>