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REJECTED | Massachusetts Register of Deeds John O’Brien is First in the Nation to Say NO to Recording Robo-signed Documents
Robo-signed documents rejected by John O’Brien following 60 Minutes show featuring Lynn Szymoniak
Massachusetts Register of Deeds John O’Brien is rejecting foreclosure documents signed by known robo-signers.
O’Brien is one of a handful of officials nationwide
who began pulling court documents following a 60 Minutes story on
foreclosure fraud that featured a Palm Beach County homeowner.
On Tuesday, Obrien said he rejected two
robo-signed documents submitted to his registry for recording and plans
to continue doing so.
Some quotes from the press release...
“the buck stops here”
~
“My Registry will not be a
knowing participant in this fraud against homeowners. From today
forward, lenders be on notice, the Southern Essex District Registry of
Deeds will not record robo-signed documents.”
~
“I find this
practice very troubling on many levels. It has completely jaded my
understanding that a notarized document was something that could be
relied upon.”
~
“If these documents are signed by anyone
other than the noted signatories, these notaries and those that employed
them should be held accountable for the fraudulent documents that they
have produced and the havoc they have caused to chains of title
everywhere.”
~
“Knowing what I now know, it would be a
dereliction of my duties as the keeper of the records to record these
documents and any other documents that contain questionable signatures.
To do so, would make me a willing participant in a continuing scheme
which has corrupted the chain of title of thousands of Essex County
property owners. I have decided to put a stop to this reckless behavior
and hold these lenders and their agents accountable for the authenticity
of what they are attempting to record in my Registry. I do not believe
this to be unreasonable.”
~
“Now that Register Thigpen has joined with me, I am hopeful that my other colleagues around the country will also take the same action.
I strongly believe that this will send a message, loud and clear, that
we as Registers and Recorders of Deeds, whose responsibility it is to
protect the integrity of the land recordation system, will not be a
party to any fraudulent scheme that may damage individual’s property
rights”
~
Jeff Thigpen joins O’Brien’s effort saying...
“The
basic question here is whether we as Recorders are going to sit on our
hands, in the face of what appears to be clear fraud or are we going to
stand up for 400 years of integrity in land records? John is on the
right side of this question and these are reasonable actions that he is
taking.”
~
Be sure to send this press release to your local recorder…
Palm Beach County residents (or everyone) send this article to Sharon Bock sbock@mypalmbeachclerk.com the clerk of PBC FL.
I think she may want to know how to protect the people that elected her…
Full press release below…
BRAVO!
UPDATE: And then there were two... PRESS RELEASE | Register of Deeds Jeff Thigpen to REJECT Robo-signed Documents
www.4closureFraud.org
»
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Regarding Thigpen, given North Carolina's notary policy and foreclosure procedures, it is impossible for a robo-signed document to be generated here. This is political grandstanding.
ROFLMAO !!! What kinds of drugs are using on a regular basis, besides hopium? There are bizzillions of these fraudulent documents floating and thousands have been sent to DOJ by folks auditing for FNM & FRE so they can be buried. Burying them does not make them any less fraudulent. If you still believe that the governmental systems anywhere make it impossible to conduce this kind of fraud I suggest you go to the Yahoo message boards to meet your desires for self deception.
Zero robo-signed promissory notes or other significant chain of title mortgage docs exist in the state of North Carolina.
On the surface your statement sounds like total and utter shite but obvioulsly you are baiting.
I'll be your Huckleberry. Why are there no robo signers sighting in South Carolina?
Open season year round?
North Carolina, dumbass. I have no idea what transpires in that third world to the south. In North Carolina, notaries on the front end of the mortgage process are held to a very high standard and are personally liable for their actions. At foreclose in North Carolina, you must appear in a hearing before the county clerk and provide evidence of valid mortgage chain of title. By providing excellent protections on the life of a mortgage, significant chain of title issues are effectively precluded. That is why our AG and Sec State have remained silent as Thigpen feathers his political bed.
hahahahahahahhahahahaha
Very high standards
hahahahahahahhahahahhaha
Prove me wrong. The Register of Deeds in question published 4800 robo-signed docs, none of which were significant.
Took long enough but finally, someone with some stones to just take it by the horns and say no. Good for you mate!
sadness for linda green
Hooray for Mr. O'Brien. This country needs more local and state officials to have this kind of backbone.
I just forwarded this information to my state recording office and this was the quick response.
Hello Mr. T,
Thank you for sending the link to the article on "Robo-signed" documents. This is a troubling issue. The statutes and regulations pertaining to recording in Alaska do not give us the authority to reject documents if they meet acceptance criteria. (Here is a link to our guidelines: http://www.recorder.alaska.gov/preparingDocs.cfm)
If a document is submitted with a signature and a notary acknowledgement, and all other criteria has been met, we must accept it for recording. The act of recording however, does not make a document legal, binding, or valid. Alaska law requires that the submitter/preparer of the document must ensure it meets all legal requirements.
Perhaps if enough consumers protest this ongoing activity by certain lenders, something will change.
Vicky Backus
State Recorder
550 West 7th Avenue Suite 1210
Anchorage, AK 99501
907-269-8882 phone
907-269-8912 fax
If a document is submitted with a signature and a notary acknowledgement, and all other criteria has been met, we must accept it for recording.
So the question becomes: if Alaska's recorders know that the proper criteria have not been met, are they free to not accept it for recording?
I'm waiting to see some action from the neighboring State of Rhode Island.
I threw this on another post about blogging and it got buried. This is playing out in real time today. Can't wait for the response.
TRO and Preliminary Injunction Granted. Who cares? Not Harmon Law.
Harmon Law is based in MA so dollars to doughnuts Mr. O'Brien has heard of this cast of characters.
Downloadable on Scribd
I'll put the transcript up soon.
As most of us know by now Harmon Law of Newton, MA is, for the time being, in the same business as that of the now disgraced (former) Law Firm of David J. Stern of Plantation, FL. In fact, Harmon Law's owner served on Stern's Board of Directors until it became obvious Stern's firm was swirling the drain. At which point he jumped ship in an apparent move to focus more directly on his own dubious affairs.
It remains equally obvious that both of the fine institutions mentioned above behave in much the same way. May they suffer the same fate...
Bravo, about time someone owned up to their responsibility; hopefully this sticks.
I can't wait until the discovery of fee-forfeiture.
Are there any guesses as to lost revenue in local coffers for God's work??
Wasn't the Patriot Act robo-signed?
First thing the banks are going to do is file a petition for a writ of mandamas, and get a judge to order the registrar to record the documents.
No, they will get their congresscritters to sign federal legislation to pre-empt the state property registration laws.
I thought I'd forward to you a Press Release from the Register of Deeds in Salem, MA. It's a notification that he (John O'Brian) will not register documents that have been robo signed. I am curious as to whether your office has taken a similar position? Thigpen joins O’Brien’s effort saying “The basic question here is whether we as Recorders are going to sit on our hands, in the face of what appears to be clear fraud or are we going to stand up for 400 years of integrity in land records? John is on the right side of this question and these are reasonable actions that he is taking.” I look forward to hearing from you.
http://www.scribd.com/doc/57300997/Massachusetts-Register-of-Deeds-John-...
Most of these title docs were originated years ago, and the banks then were sure that they could do anything. So I guess you could say that they stepped on their weiners.
Kinda like closing the barn door long after horse and chickens have gone!
Ok... so how do you know if the signatures are bogus? Do they have the ability to cross reference the same companies/signatures? If a "non-infamous" name appears executing the document, then what?
I guess they can go after the low hanging fruit, but unless the technology is there (or the desire for public servants to "work"), then I'm not sure how far the recorders are gonna get.
They can just watch the court filings and the show-me-the-note cases to see which signatories are identified by litigants as robo-signers, then check their registries to confirm repeat names with vastly different signatures.
Sounds simple - if you only get a handful of documents each day.
Try doing that for thousands of documents a day - on a budget. I don't see it happening.
We all might want to stop and think about whether we want these 'public servants' making rather arbitrary decisions about which documents are worthy of recording and which are not - and then probably breaking the law by refusing to record documents.
The states I'm familiar with don't give the recorder's the legal wiggle room to do this anyway. If a document meets the basic criteria (VERY basic in some states) then it is entitled to record and the recorder is required by law to do their duty and record it. Presumably the recorder would also report suspected crimes to the district attorney who would investigate and prosecute offenders (yeah, like that's going to happen).
While I appreciate the sentiment to have pure, truthful records - this is a horrible way to deal with crimes like fraudulent notary acknowledgments.
double...oh well. Fuck You Seifer. You still suck cock.
There are hurdles...both seen and unseen. Look at this ass-hole. Marc Seifer - Court Approved Handwriting Analyst and Document Examiner, PHD, etc.
He provides his "expert testimony" in court and then for some odd reason finds the need to hire a Rhodes Scholar Attorney to help him explain how his own testimony was all wrong. What happened Mr. Expert? Too Big too Fail scared you away? Paid you off? Douche Bag. That's ok. I'm sure there is a doc examiner out there with a spine.
Here's a link to his "Expert Testimony"
Fuck you Seifer. Every closet you've ever been in better be clean. Fucking no good traitor. You suck.
Meanwhile, our absent State AG Coakley wonders who will fund her next run:
http://www.opensecrets.org/races/contrib.php?cycle=2010&id=MAS1
Ironically, I fall under this District and my municipality uses MERS.
However, Pres Obama signed the patriot act bill using the robo-technology. Therefore I have to assume this poor guy is fighting a loosing battle and will be overturnable.
This is excellent. Every Recorder should do the same.
The MassAG, Coakley, will work around this; Her Senate campaign against Scott was largely financed by the banksters.
Do you really think they'd whack the guy though? I mean if the guy isn't even on the take do think the banksters are going to expect millions of Americans to turn the other cheek?
The banksters will run some well funded bankster whore against him next time. Thanks to Citizens United there will be no limit on the money spent to defeat one guy standing up for the rule of law
It's kind of sad it has taken this long for a register of deeds to state that he will not knowingly accept fraudulent documents. Im sort of surprised it happened in MA first though. I would have guessed Texas.
Texas was recently told to STFU when they tried to resist the TSA. Either they will STFU for a while, or use the appearance of it to draft secession papers. Take a guess at which outcome is more likely?
My guess is that TX will STFU, and roll over.
They missed their chance - should have told 'em to "go ahead, shut the
airports. We'll keep our oil."
Now, it's going to be a lot harder, and after years of being a 'state',
I think they are a bit too pudgy to fight for very long.
Score one for the good guys! Many thanks to John O'Brien. Hopefully the rest of the recorders will follow suit.
Given the homeowner advocacy I've seen from the local AG (*crickets*), I expect the Mass. AG to tell Mr. O'Brien to STFU and GBTW because it's a state issue and they're working on it (in collusion with the banksters, of course).
Yeah, Martha "Marcia" Coakley is the local version of Eric "Place" Holder. She seemingly never does anything.
hope this honest man...
lives to see another
sunrise...
Do these dudes know they are putting their lives at risk?
Being a county official, he is a just a small player, so it is possible he is a 'True Believer' in the infallibility of government, with liberty and justice, for all.
Well, until he finds himself black-mailed with hookers and blow, ala Spitzer, or has a hot-tub, or some other exploitable problem.
Exactly! I hope he doesn't stay at a New York hotel soon!
Hallelujah, maybe America still have people with moral character...
I did my best, it wasn't much
I couldn't feel, so I tried to touch
I've told the truth, I didn't come to fool you
And even though it all went wrong
I'll stand before the Lord of Song
With nothing on my tongue but Hallelujah
Hallelujah, Hallelujah, Hallelujah, Hallelujah
Careful, they're armed with golden pens of unlimited ink and I'll bet they have one very stong arm.
If I ever get to Massachussets, I need to buy both these folks a cold one!
Massholes be proud...bitches!
Done.
I just sent both of them a Thank You email for standing up for the rule of law.
Good idea.