# "Foreclosure mill" law firm hosts homeless themed party **URL:** \ **Category:** The BBQ Pit\ **Created:** [October 30, 2011, 3:31am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/foreclosure-mill-law-firm-hosts-homeless-themed-party/601251 "2011-10-30T03:31:14Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 4
**Author:** ![Princhester](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/3e96dc/32.png) [@Princhester](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Princhester)\ **Post date:** [November 1, 2011, 4:24am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/foreclosure-mill-law-firm-hosts-homeless-themed-party/601251/61 "2011-11-01T04:24:43Z")
> [@waterj2](#): > > Also, the possibility that they’ll actually get punished for the pervasive fraud in their industry. I mean, it’s not like they’ll go to jail, or anything, but Eric Schneiderman seems like he wants to look into things, rather than going with the Obama Administration’s plan to pass out the slaps on the wrist and “don’t do it agains”, and that could hurt those year end bonuses. Do paralegals and working lawyers at a firm like Baums get year end bonuses? That isn’t a rhetorical question, I don’t know. Although they don’t where I come from. I don’t think that any paralegals and working lawyers face any realistic chance at all - to an extent that would cause them stress - that they will suffer any consequences of alleged pervasive fraud. Both because it won’t come down to their level and because it probably doesn’t exist. ---
**Author:** ![Zeriel](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/z/58956e/32.png) [@Zeriel](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Zeriel)\ **Post date:** [November 1, 2011, 5:05am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/foreclosure-mill-law-firm-hosts-homeless-themed-party/601251/62 "2011-11-01T05:05:59Z")
> [@Princhester](#): > > The hangmen joke amongst themselves in a sick way, probably, just like nurses do and doctors do and soldiers do. For this to be acceptable, it has to first be demonstrated that the job is hard on an emotional level; that is, it is the responsibility of the hangman not to use gallows humor until it’s perfectly clear that he’s not at ease with his profession but he does it because he has to. Any other course risks the public thinking he’s a sadistic dick. ---
**Author:** ![Princhester](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/3e96dc/32.png) [@Princhester](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Princhester)\ **Post date:** [November 1, 2011, 5:38am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/foreclosure-mill-law-firm-hosts-homeless-themed-party/601251/63 "2011-11-01T05:38:58Z")
I think what you are trying to say is that for it to be _seen_ to be acceptable, it has first to be seen to be demonstrated that the job is hard on an emotional level. You may well be right if that is what you meant. I don’t need much demonstration, personally, because I don’t find it hard to imagine that kicking people out of their homes would be distressing, even when you understand why it has to happen. ---
**Author:** ![Miller](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/miller/32/481_2.png) [@Miller](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Miller)\ **Post date:** [November 1, 2011, 7:08am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/foreclosure-mill-law-firm-hosts-homeless-themed-party/601251/64 "2011-11-01T07:08:00Z")
> [@Princhester](#): > > The hangmen joke amongst themselves in a sick way, probably, just like nurses do and doctors do and soldiers do. I’m sure they do. I suspect the same can be said for state torturers, mafia hit men, and telemarketers. My sympathy for the professional complaints of people in any of these careers is remarkably low. ---
**Author:** ![Princhester](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/3e96dc/32.png) [@Princhester](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Princhester)\ **Post date:** [November 1, 2011, 7:52am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/foreclosure-mill-law-firm-hosts-homeless-themed-party/601251/65 "2011-11-01T07:52:06Z")
You are of course free to have what views you like. However, IMHO torture, murder and telemarketing are all immoral and should all be illegal. Contrastingly much as I have sympathy for people who lose their homes, I think that foreclosure is a necessary evil under our economic system\*. As such, being broadly happy to see the financial system not collapse, and one’s pension plan remain in the black (which most of us are) while fingerpointing at those who do the dirty work for one at the pointy end of the system seems more than a little hypocritical to me. \*And I’m not allergic to discussion of alternatives, but that is a whole other thing ---
**Author:** ![phouka](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/c5a1d2/32.png) [@phouka](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/phouka)\ **Post date:** [November 1, 2011, 7:59am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/foreclosure-mill-law-firm-hosts-homeless-themed-party/601251/66 "2011-11-01T07:59:41Z")
> [@Princhester](#): > > I don’t need much demonstration, personally, because I don’t find it hard to imagine that kicking people out of their homes would be distressing, even when you understand why it has to happen. If you were employed by a firm which focused first on doing what it could to keep mortgage holders in their home before pursuing eviction and foreclosure, then yes. If you, as an employee, and your company made sure every T was crossed, and every i dotted, sure. Even if it was the job you took to pay the bills and put food on the table, and you were just checking off each item on the list, okay. But this is not that. This is people who are using the legal and financial systems to drown home owners already sinking in a turbulent economy. They have a record of skipping _legally required_ steps in the process, of abusing the court system, and of subverting the law. And, they are doing it for profit. So, no. They don’t get to use “gallows humor” as an excuse. Any more than Jeffrey Dahmer gets to make fart jokes about how his last meal is fighting back. ---
**Author:** ![Isamu](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/i/7c8e57/32.png) [@Isamu](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Isamu)\ **Post date:** [November 1, 2011, 8:17am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/foreclosure-mill-law-firm-hosts-homeless-themed-party/601251/67 "2011-11-01T08:17:01Z")
At the very beginning of my law career I was working in a firm that had a lot of government contracts. One of these contracts was to administer foreclosures on people who had been on a government-run program to provide housing loans to families who wouldn’t typically qualify for bank loans any other way. Many, many people defaulted on their loan repayments despite the generous terms, and so it was quite lucrative business for our firm. Most of us never had to see the up-close and personal aspects of it although we all knew what the job entailed. So, while we were pleased to have the work, no-one ever so much as snickered about it. And we certainly didn’t throw parties about it - that’s kind of inhuman. ---
**Author:** ![Princhester](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/3e96dc/32.png) [@Princhester](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Princhester)\ **Post date:** [November 1, 2011, 8:32am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/foreclosure-mill-law-firm-hosts-homeless-themed-party/601251/68 "2011-11-01T08:32:17Z")
> [@phouka](#): > > But this is not that. This is people who are using the legal and financial systems to drown home owners already sinking in a turbulent economy. They have a record of skipping _legally required_ steps in the process, of abusing the court system, and of subverting the law. I’m skeptical for two reasons. Firstly, I don’t believe that this thread would turn out much different if the “homeless themed party” was some sort of super-careful foreclosure firm. Many people are just upset about foreclosure and hate banks and lawyers. Secondly, is there some sort of even-handed full enquiry that supports what you say about this firm? I have to deal with “mill” style law firms. Sure there are always some rules bent or broken and errors made but I’d have to see something objective before I concluded the standard was so bad as to justify the view they are as evil as those in this thread suggest, as opposed to averagely (in)competent. In my experience when people are under catastrophic financial (and consequently legal) pressure, very many will say and do almost anything to try to fool others and themselves that they have been wronged in some way. The forms haven’t been filled in quite correctly or the exact steps haven’t been taken. This gets blown up out of all proportion to the basic underlying facts (such as that they owe way more money than they can pay). No doubt also in some cases those doing the foreclosing make serious errors. Overall however I would strongly suspect unless I had very good evidence to the contrary that it is a “fuck one goat” thing: in the vast majority of cases people are foreclosed on because that is the correct legal and financial result, but when the foreclosure firm occasionally gets one wrong this is trumpeted about out of all proportion, because it is a good story. ---
**Author:** ![The\_Tao\_s\_Revenge](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/73ab20/32.png) [@The\_Tao\_s\_Revenge](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/The_Tao_s_Revenge)\ **Post date:** [November 1, 2011, 9:25am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/foreclosure-mill-law-firm-hosts-homeless-themed-party/601251/69 "2011-11-01T09:25:10Z")
**Princhester** , assuming they’re not evil house stealing pieces of shit. Why’d the mock Susan Chana Lask and wish death upon her? Seems like if they were interested in not putting children out on the frozen street needlessly they’d welcome the correction. The cry babies afraid of a little more paperwork, or a little less house snatching? Further even of the legitimate foreclosures, how many are because of unemployment resulting directly from how bad these people’s big bank clients trashed the economy? Put simply, imagine you had a business that provided your lively hood, and I own the mortgage on your house. One day I’m doing something just as risky and stupid as Credit Default Swoops were. What it is isn’t important, but it results in one of your biggest customer’s business burning down. Without that money coming in you go out of business, and can’t make your payment. I then hire an attorney who knows full well you’re condition is directly my fault, and foreclose. Meanwhile the attorney gleefully throws a party mocking your attempts to keep your home, and making light of you sleeping in the street. You saying the attorney doesn’t deserve some scorn? ---
**Author:** ![Princhester](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/3e96dc/32.png) [@Princhester](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Princhester)\ **Post date:** [November 1, 2011, 9:51am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/foreclosure-mill-law-firm-hosts-homeless-themed-party/601251/70 "2011-11-01T09:51:43Z")
I’m very wary of anything I see in the media because I’ve seen too many beat ups from the other side. The OP link quotes part of Baum’s response comprising a denial but it isn’t clear that the response didn’t go on to say something that would give a different picture. The column appears to me to be a polemic and I don’t think the columnist would have been too interested in giving any alternate viewpoint much room. Having said that, the costumes and signs etc put up by some departments at Baums at that party seem perhaps to be in bad taste, insensitive and stupid. So were the jokes my mother’s nursing colleagues would make. There are dickheads in every crowd and people do stupid things sometimes, particularly if they are under stress or socially isolated by their profession. I just don’t think these people are likely to be the outstandingly evil assholes that some think. Your anecdote is highly contrived and anyway one has to be pragmatic. We are where we are. As I said above, that doesn’t mean foreclosure isn’t at this point a necessary evil. ---
**Author:** ![The\_Tao\_s\_Revenge](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/73ab20/32.png) [@The\_Tao\_s\_Revenge](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/The_Tao_s_Revenge)\ **Post date:** [November 1, 2011, 10:22am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/foreclosure-mill-law-firm-hosts-homeless-themed-party/601251/71 "2011-11-01T10:22:35Z")
> [@Princhester](#): > > I’m very wary of anything I see in the media because I’ve seen too many beat ups from the other side. The OP link quotes part of Baum’s response comprising a denial but it isn’t clear that the response didn’t go on to say something that would give a different picture. The column appears to me to be a polemic and I don’t think the columnist would have been too interested in giving any alternate viewpoint much room. > > Having said that, the costumes and signs etc put up by some departments at Baums at that party seem perhaps to be in bad taste, insensitive and stupid. So were the jokes my mother’s nursing colleagues would make. There are dickheads in every crowd and people do stupid things sometimes, particularly if they are under stress or socially isolated by their profession. I just don’t think these people are likely to be the outstandingly evil assholes that some think. > > Your anecdote is highly contrived and anyway one has to be pragmatic. We are where we are. As I said above, that doesn’t mean foreclosure isn’t at this point a necessary evil. “Highly contrived”? It’s pretty much what happened. True or false, banker greed for Default Credit Swoops caused gigantic recession leading to high unemployment? True. Bankers are now foreclosing on the homes of those unemployed? True. Please tell me where it isn’t reflective of reality? We are where we are because of these goon’s employers. Assuming it wasn’t just a few bad apples, why was this party allowed at all? Would your mother’s nursing home have allowed a party mocking the elderly? I had a mother, a grandmother, and an aunt who worked at nursing homes. Never heard them mocking old people. That aside even the Federal Government believes they did something wrong: [http://www.newsday.com/classifieds/real-estate/real-li-1.812034/homeowners-can-still-sue-foreclosure-firm-1.3234565](http://www.newsday.com/classifieds/real-estate/real-li-1.812034/homeowners-can-still-sue-foreclosure-firm-1.3234565) > [@](#): > > The firm’s agreement to pay $2 million to the federal government releases it from potential claims under the Financial Institutions Reform, Recovery and Enforcement Act of 1989. > [@](#): > > As part of the deal with federal authorities, Baum did not admit to any wrongdoing in foreclosure documentation practices. In a statement, he said his firm would “continue to adhere to the highest ethical standards.” > > The federal probe came after the robo-signing scandal broke in the fall of last year. > > **Employees for three major lenders admitted they signed thousands of foreclosure-related documents without checking the accuracy**. What do you call someone who forecloses on a house knowing full well it could be fraudulent? Finally fuck your soulless pragmatism, the people have a right to be angry. Tell me they don’t. Tell me. ---
**Author:** ![The\_Tao\_s\_Revenge](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/73ab20/32.png) [@The\_Tao\_s\_Revenge](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/The_Tao_s_Revenge)\ **Post date:** [November 1, 2011, 10:35am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/foreclosure-mill-law-firm-hosts-homeless-themed-party/601251/72 "2011-11-01T10:35:21Z")
Here’s documentation of Baum’s typical clients: [“Robo-signing” of mortgages still a problem](http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2011/07/18/national/main20080533.shtml) > [@](#): > > County officials in at least three states say they have received thousands of mortgage documents with questionable signatures since last fall, suggesting that the practices, known collectively as “robo-signing,” remain widespread in the industry. > [@](#): > > In all of these cases, robo-signing involves people signing documents and swearing to their accuracy without verifying any of the information. > . > [@](#): > > To combat the stream of suspect filings, O’Brien and Jeff Thigpen, the register of deeds in North Carolina’s Guilford County, stopped accepting questionable paperwork June 7. They say they had no choice after complaining to federal and state authorities for months without getting anywhere. > > Since then, O’Brien has received nine documents from Bank of America purportedly signed by Linda Burton, another name on authorities’ list of known robo-signers. For years, his office has regularly received documents signed with Burton’s name but written in such vastly different handwriting that two forensic investigators say it’s highly unlikely it all came from the same person. > > O’Brien returned the nine Burton documents to Bank of America in mid-June. He told the bank he would not file them unless the bank signed an affidavit certifying the signature and accepting responsibility if the title was called into question down the road. Instead, Bank of America sent new documents with new signatures and new notaries. What do you call someone who knowingly takes fraudulent work? ---
**Author:** ![Ludovic](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/7ab992/32.png) [@Ludovic](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ludovic)\ **Post date:** [November 1, 2011, 12:12pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/foreclosure-mill-law-firm-hosts-homeless-themed-party/601251/73 "2011-11-01T12:12:52Z")
> [@Princhester](#): > > I’m skeptical for two reasons. > > Firstly, I don’t believe that this thread would turn out much different if the “homeless themed party” was some sort of super-careful foreclosure firm. Firstly, you’d be wrong. I wouldn’t be posting here, for one. I, too, did not want to worry too much about not jumping through every legal hurdle in order to foreclose on people who did not pay their mortgages. Except, those hurdles are there for a reason. There are people who have been foreclosed on that weren’t behind on their payments. There are even people who have been foreclosed by banks that didn’t even own their mortgages. Whose homes didn’t even HAVE a mortgage. Yeah, I have absolutely no sympathy for those people. They should…oh fuck it, I can’t even think of a sarcastic comment for that. This so-called “gallows humor” party is dancing on the outright theft of their homes. ---
**Author:** ![Zeriel](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/z/58956e/32.png) [@Zeriel](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Zeriel)\ **Post date:** [November 1, 2011, 3:25pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/foreclosure-mill-law-firm-hosts-homeless-themed-party/601251/74 "2011-11-01T15:25:40Z")
> [@Princhester](#): > > I think what you are trying to say is that for it to be _seen_ to be acceptable, it has first to be seen to be demonstrated that the job is hard on an emotional level. You may well be right if that is what you meant. No, I meant exactly what I said. Gallows humor is okay when the person doing a job is laid down under that burden as hard as the people who are hurt in the course of the job–it’s why we typically let doctors/nurses/EMTs/firefighters do it with no question, we get weird about some cops in some places doing it, and the executioner generally doesn’t get to do it. > [@](#): > > I don’t need much demonstration, personally, because I don’t find it hard to imagine that kicking people out of their homes would be distressing, even when you understand why it has to happen. I have worked with lawyers (hell, with _people_) long enough to know that there are a lot of people for whom a fat sack of cash money will literally take away all their guilt. > [@Princhester](#): > > Firstly, I don’t believe that this thread would turn out much different if the “homeless themed party” was some sort of super-careful foreclosure firm. > Many people are just upset about foreclosure and hate banks and lawyers. I think you’re actually highly wrong here. Hell, even if the party had shown some “ha ha, only serious” or remorsefulness, it would have been easier to swallow as gallows humor. ---
**Author:** ![Zeriel](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/z/58956e/32.png) [@Zeriel](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Zeriel)\ **Post date:** [November 1, 2011, 3:33pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/foreclosure-mill-law-firm-hosts-homeless-themed-party/601251/75 "2011-11-01T15:33:05Z")
As **Tao’s Revenge** says, their motive of “mocking the victims” (as opposed to “gallows humor in a tough job”) is absolutely proven by the treatment of the effigy of a lawyer who has been defending their victims by pointing out the many procedural errors in the foreclosures perpetrated by this firm. Nurses might mock their patients to cope with the mundane horror and small indignities they are forced to commit working in a senior care facility, but I think you’d agree that if they went on to mock and punish-in-effigy a candy-striper, that’d be evidence that they were being mean-spirited. ---
**Author:** ![Miller](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/miller/32/481_2.png) [@Miller](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Miller)\ **Post date:** [November 1, 2011, 7:35pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/foreclosure-mill-law-firm-hosts-homeless-themed-party/601251/76 "2011-11-01T19:35:39Z")
> [@Princhester](#): > > You are of course free to have what views you like. However, IMHO torture, murder and telemarketing are all immoral and should all be illegal. Contrastingly much as I have sympathy for people who lose their homes, I think that foreclosure is a necessary evil under our economic system\*. As such, being broadly happy to see the financial system not collapse, and one’s pension plan remain in the black (which most of us are) while fingerpointing at those who do the dirty work for one at the pointy end of the system seems more than a little hypocritical to me. I’m not saying that no one should ever be foreclosed against, ever. Like you say, a necessary component to the concept of lending people money is a mechanism whereby the lender can recover some of his loses if the loan is defaulted. On the other hand, I think there’s a distinct moral difference between a bank which, malfeasance aside, wants people to make their payments and generally be successful, and a company that exists solely to generate profit by increasing the misery of others. While what these sorts of firms do may be legal, even necessary, I think it says something about the character of a person who would seek out work like this. ---
**Author:** ![Euphonious\_Polemic](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/euphonious_polemic/32/3002_2.png) [@Euphonious\_Polemic](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Euphonious_Polemic)\ **Post date:** [November 1, 2011, 8:41pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/foreclosure-mill-law-firm-hosts-homeless-themed-party/601251/77 "2011-11-01T20:41:36Z")
> [@Princhester](#): > > The hangmen joke amongst themselves in a sick way, probably, just like nurses do and doctors do and soldiers do. Here’s how your analogy needs to be in order to be correct for (for example) nurses: The nurses in question would have had to have (as a profession) undertaken something massively risky that put people’s lives at risk, which ended up putting a bunch of people into the hospital. Let’s say that they cut corners on sterilizing instruments or something. Then, some specific nurses (with these sick people in their care) would have had to have done some more shady and unethical things to these patients. Let’s say that they started selling the patients possessions to pay the hospital bills. Finally, these nurses would have had a party, complete with photographic evidence, in which they dressed up as these sick patients and mocked them. Perhaps complete with a coffin and effigy of someone who was trying to blow the whistle on their unethical behavior. There. That’s a complete analogy. Do you think it works now? ---
**Author:** ![elucidator](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/8edcca/32.png) [@elucidator](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/elucidator)\ **Post date:** [November 2, 2011, 1:59am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/foreclosure-mill-law-firm-hosts-homeless-themed-party/601251/78 "2011-11-02T01:59:06Z")
The analogy is really ugly, isn’t it? Oh, wait, I see your point… ---
**Author:** ![Lust4Life](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/ecc23a/32.png) [@Lust4Life](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lust4Life)\ **Post date:** [November 3, 2011, 4:48pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/foreclosure-mill-law-firm-hosts-homeless-themed-party/601251/79 "2011-11-03T16:48:05Z")
> [@BigT](#): > > So not only do you not understand the definition of gallows humor nor the difference between a paragraph and sentence, but you also can’t process quotation marks? I don’t think Zeriel is the one that needs to be informed about college. Sorry but you’ll have to do better then that, you got one thing correct in your post, ie. you don’t think, probably ever. ---
**Author:** ![Lust4Life](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/ecc23a/32.png) [@Lust4Life](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lust4Life)\ **Post date:** [November 3, 2011, 4:53pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/foreclosure-mill-law-firm-hosts-homeless-themed-party/601251/80 "2011-11-03T16:53:35Z")
> [@BigT](#): > > So not only do you not understand the definition of gallows humor nor the difference between a paragraph and sentence, but you also can’t process quotation marks? I don’t think Zeriel is the one that needs to be informed about college. Well if you want to be informed about college I’m afraid that you’ll just have to look it up for yourself instead of getting a grownup to do it for you. Mind you I shouldn’t bother if I were you; cos you’ve fat chance of ever getting into one. And Purlease spare me the comeback that you’re actually a Phd. at Harvard cos I aint buying it. In fact I wouldn’t even buy you having finished High School. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/foreclosure-mill-law-firm-hosts-homeless-themed-party/601251.md?page=3) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/foreclosure-mill-law-firm-hosts-homeless-themed-party/601251.md?page=5)