Tennessee Legal Malpractice Attorneys Talk about Mass Joinder Lawsuit Scams
If your home is being foreclosed upon, you may be desperate to save it. You are likely to want to explore any and all avenues that could possibly lead to a situation where you would be able to keep your home. Unfortunately you, and other homeowners like you, are in a position where you could be taken advantage of, if you are not careful.
While there are many foreclosure avoidance scams to watch out for, there is one particular type that you should be especially wary of. It is called a mass joinder lawsuit, and it has been especially successful at attracting victims because it is presented by people who appear to have an aura of credibility about them because of their professional status. That’s right, the mass joinder variety of foreclosure avoidance scam is carried out by people who either are attorneys or who are posing as attorneys.
How this scheme works is that homeowners who are facing foreclosure receive letters which invite them to join forces with other similarly situated homeowners and sue their mortgage companies in an effort to force the lenders to modify all of their loans.
Homeowners who follow up on the letter with a phone call to the telephone number printed on the letter are told that their claim is likely to succeed. Once the homeowner has decided that they want to take part in the mass litigation, they must pay a few thousand dollars up front in order to get involved in the lawsuit. Unfortunately, once the money is paid, the homeowners are likely to get nothing in return. In some cases the suit is filed, and in others it is not. If it gets filed, it is often neglected and gets dismissed by the courts. Whatever the result, the homeowners lose their money and do not obtain the loan modifications that they were made to believe would likely be coming their way. Mass joinder “lawsuits” differ from class action lawsuits because they name hundreds of individual plaintiffs who have different factual circumstances, where class action plaintiffs all share common circumstances. Perhaps even more importantly, plaintiffs in class action lawsuits are not asked to pay money up front in order to be included in the class.
Fortunately, some of the people who have propagated mass joinder schemes have been caught. One disbarred attorney who established a mass joinder “law firm” in Florida after his pervious mass joinder “law firm” had been shut down in California is being sued for taking money from Florida homeowners. His role in the California mass joinder scam was the misconduct that led to his disbarment.
If you think that you might be a victim of legal malpractice of any kind, it is important to speak to an attorney right away. The experienced Memphis Legal Malpractice Attorneys at Bailey & Greer, PLLC are here to help you. To learn more, call 901-680-9777 to schedule a time to discuss your case. At Bailey & Greer, PLLC, we are small enough to care, big enough to fight, and experienced enough to win.
Since graduating magna cum laude in 2005 from the University of Memphis School of Law, Thomas has helped make a difference in the lives of victims of serious personal injury, wrongful death, and professional negligence. Thomas has extensive trial experience in both state and federal court. Among other victories in the courtroom, Thomas obtained several impressive jury verdicts and settlements
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