Parties In Michigan Predatory Lending Lawsuits Wrestle Over Forum Selection; Homeowners Ask Federal Judge To Kick Cases Back To State Court

In Troy, Michigan, the Daily Tribune reports:

• Officials at an organization representing homeowners battling their mortgage lenders say hundreds more people in the tri-county area will join additional lawsuits. Officials at Michigan Loan Compliance Advisory Group Inc. in Troy said they plan to file lawsuits including up to another 1,000 plaintiffs against financial institutions for deceptive lending, excessive fees and other wrongdoing in granting subprime mortgages. That’s on top of the 88 plaintiffs representing 78 mortgages in Oakland and Macomb counties who through Michigan Loan Compliance sued more than two dozen banks for awarding inflated mortgages to borrowers.

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• The pending cases in Oakland, Macomb and a third in Wayne County were filed in state circuit court, but have since been moved to U.S. District Court in Detroit. However, Loan Compliance attorney Ziyad Kased has asked federal Judge Arthur Tarnow to return the Oakland case to Judge Colleen O’Brien in the Oakland court in Pontiac and said he believes federal Judge Nancy Edmunds on her own may return the Macomb case back to circuit Judge John Foster in Mount Clemens. Kased said the Oakland case should remain in state court because all of the defendants and plaintiffs do not have different state residences, which is a requirement to get the case moved.

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• Kased urged the federal judges to act soon. “Plaintiffs pray this court remand this case as quickly as possible because certain plaintiffs are facing imminent foreclosures and plaintiffs must file requests for temporary injunctions to prevent irreparable harm,” Kased said.

For more, see Mortgage fraud accusers promise hundreds more cases (Oakland, Macomb cases currently in federal court but may return to local state courts).