Day: March 20, 2009

BREAKING: Judge Senter issues Order for Discovery prior to hearing in Rigsby Qui Tam

You helped me find the reasons why
It took me by surprise that you understood

What a surprise it was, too – not the Order, as it had to come, but that Judge Senter issued the order for discovery prior to the hearing with no pending motion.

By prior order [261], I declined the Relators’ motions [212][230] for additional discovery prior to the hearing on Defendants’ consolidated motions presently scheduled for May 20, 2009…My ruling on the Relators’ discovery motions has not been formally challenged, but the Relators have raised the issue of discovery in an indirect way.

There’s no need for speculation, Judge Senter made his intent perfectly clear – providing both sides a full and fair opportunity to present the evidence they feel is relevant to the merits of the McIntosh flood claim.

In their responsive pleadings [264], the Relators assert that they are unduly limited in the evidence they can present because they do not have possession of the McIntosh claims file. The Relators have identified four sets of claims file documents they wish to obtain in order to present their side of this controversy: 1) all damage estimates State Farm made for the McIntosh property; 2) a full copy of the transaction logs on the McIntosh claims; 3) digital photographs of the damage to the McIntosh residence; and 4) correspondence related to Forensic Analysis Engineering Corporation’s assessment of the damage to the McIntosh property.

In addition to these documents, the Relators have identified seven witnesses Continue reading “BREAKING: Judge Senter issues Order for Discovery prior to hearing in Rigsby Qui Tam”

More on $enator Chri$ Dodd’$ Relation$hip with AIG and Countrywide’$ Angelo Mozilo. Liddy educates WaPo readers on contract sanctity

I noted Time Magazine has come out with a list of the guilty in their 25 People to Blame for the Financial Crisis. This topic is special to me in a personal way and I’m reminded of a conversation I had with a reporter Tuesday as we discussed the now locally infamous Shred-it Trucks that became parking lot fixtures at the local State Farm offices in the spring of 2006. Steve took pictures but not for this blog as we had no concept of slabbed in those days. Rather he gave the pictures to former SKG lawyer Zach Butterworth. In that sense we feel some ownership for that piece of news, no doubt the same sense of ownership felt by the Rigsby sisters who saw from the inside what was being fed into the shredder.

Similarly Russell, Steve and I feel a similar ownership on that subprime thang as we were posters on the Countrywide Yahoo board at that time. It was Katrina that landed the company on my radar screen as I was surprised to learn some friends that had their mortgage with them could not get their insurance money released so they could repair their house. In fact Countrywide (CFC) was holding far more of their insurance money than they owed on their mortgage. I’m a sucker for this type of stuff so I alerted Steve and Russell and the cyber attack began.  We made short work of CFC that day and my friend had their insurance money back the next day.  Others saw those posts and one reporter asked some questions.  Two weeks later this story appeared on page C-1 of the Wall Street Journal. Evidently someone at LSU thought enough of the article to copy it to a word doc where it resides today for all to see (it is still in the WSJ archives and a PDF I kept as well) and it is there we’ll begin as we explore what kind of company Senator Chris Dodd keeps:

Hurricane Victims Battle Banks — Gulf Coast Residents Complain Lenders Hold Insurance Money While Demanding Late Payments
The Wall Street Journal
April 27, 2006
By Valerie Bauerlein

AS HOMEOWNERS along the Gulf Coast try to recover from the devastation of hurricanes Katrina and Rita, some say mortgage lenders are refusing to turn over insurance proceeds while demanding immediate payment on overdue loans.

Hurricane victims in Louisiana and Mississippi have filed nearly 1,000 complaints with state regulators claiming mistreatment by mortgage lenders. About 800 of the complaints have been resolved, often as a result of mediation initiated by regulators.

Jim Wolf of Pass Christian, Miss., a DuPont Co. technician currently living in a company trailer, for example, wanted to use proceeds of an insurance settlement for a down payment on a new home. On Dec. 10, he sent his $40,000 insurance settlement check to giant Countrywide Financial Corp. to pay off $5,000 remaining on the mortgage of his destroyed home, expecting to get $35,000 back. He said he called Countrywide, based in Calabasas, Calif., every business day for a month, spoke to a dozen representatives and couldn’t get the balance returned. Continue reading “More on $enator Chri$ Dodd’$ Relation$hip with AIG and Countrywide’$ Angelo Mozilo. Liddy educates WaPo readers on contract sanctity”

In bailout bonus burnout, country-come-to-town meets ghetto

Over at the Allstate finance board, they call it bonusgate; but, whatever you call it, keeping up with the news of it can lead to complete and total exhaustion.  It’s all the jumping to conclusions that really wears you out, particulary when the part of you not tracking the news is trying to work.

Our good friend Sup, the hands-down favorite insurance person of the SLABBED, thinks a lot of Ed Liddy.  Sup has said in the past that Liddy goes all out supporting his employees. I don’t doubt that – not any more.

They watched quietly as members of Congress referred to them as greedy and incompetent. They heard more than one demand that their names be released to the seething American public. They heard the chairman of American International Group, Edward M. Liddy, tell lawmakers that people, in e-mails sent to AIG-FP, suggested that the firm’s leaders “should be executed with piano wire around their necks.”

The evening before, the firm’s chief operating officer, Gerry Pasciucco — whom Liddy recruited in November from Morgan Stanley to shut down Financial Products before it could do more harm to the economy — had gathered them together in the same spot. Continue reading “In bailout bonus burnout, country-come-to-town meets ghetto”