Brown v. Ocwen Loan Servicing, LLC
| Decision Date | 20 August 2015 |
| Docket Number | Civil No. PJM 14-3454 |
| Parties | RHONDA BROWN, Plaintiff, v. OCWEN LOAN SERVICING, LLC, ET AL. Defendants. |
| Court | U.S. District Court — District of Maryland |
Rhonda Brown, acting pro se, has brought this action against Ocwen Loan Servicing, LLC ("Ocwen"), Wilmington Finance, Inc. ("Wilmington"), Deutsche Bank National Trust Company ("Deutsche Bank"), Morgan Stanley Mortgage Capital, Inc., Morgan Stanley ABS Capital 1 Inc. (collectively "Morgan Stanley Defendants"), Wells Fargo Bank N.A. ("Wells Fargo"), Mortgage Electronic Registration System ("MERS"), and 100 John Doe defendants.
Brown filed her Complaint while simultaneously contesting a foreclosure action with respect to a property she formerly owned. The Complaint, which is a variation on a form complaint circulated on the internet and tracks several cases filed before this member and other members of this Court,1 asserts a variety of purported causes of action, including "lack of standing/wrongful foreclosure," fraudulent concealment, fraudulent inducement, intentional infliction of emotional distress, slander of title, quiet title, declaratory relief, rescission, and violations of the federal Truth-in-Lending Act ("TILA"), Home Ownership and Equity Protection Act ("HOEPA"), and Real Estate Settlement Procedures Act ("RESPA").
Brown filed a motion for a temporary restraining order, which the Court denied. ECF No. 5. Ocwen, Deutsche Bank, the Morgan Stanley Defendants, and MERS have filed Motions to Dismiss. ECF Nos. 8, 15, 16, 32. Brown has twice moved for leave to file an Amended Complaint, ECF Nos. 45, 48, which the Defendants oppose. Although Brown filed timely affidavits of service upon Wilmington and Wells Fargo, neither defendant has entered an appearance, and Brown has not moved for entry of default as to either defendant. In any event, the Court's review of Brown's affidavits of service suggests that service of process was defective as to these two defendants.2
Although the Complaint provides little factual detail, the Court has pieced together what appears to be the gist of the Complaint from various documents filed in this case and in the state court Foreclosure Action.3
On December 20, 2006, Brown entered into a mortgage agreement with Wilmington Finance with respect to property located at 7700 Quill Point Drive, Bowie, Maryland. The agreement refinanced a prior mortgage loan. ECF No. 8-3. The accompanying promissory Note was in the amount of $460,000, and contained a blank indorsement from Wilmington Finance. ECF No. 8-2. The Note was secured by a Deed of Trust that was assigned to MERS as a nominee for Wilmington Finance. ECF No. 8-3.
According to the Complaint, at some point, most likely in 2007, the Note was transferred to Deutsche Bank as trustee for a securitized pool of loans that the Complaint describes as "TRUST 2007-2." Compl. ¶ 29. The Court's review of the publicly available filings of the Securities and Exchange Commission indicates that "TRUST 2007-2" almost certainly refers to Morgan Stanley Home Equity Loan Trust 2007-2, for which the Morgan Stanley Defendants served as sponsor and depositor, Deutsche Bank as the trustee, and Wells Fargo as the master servicer.4
In February 2013, MERS, acting as nominee for Wilmington Finance, assigned the Deed of Trust to Deutsche Bank, possibly in anticipation of foreclosure proceedings. ECF No. 8-4. By this point, Ocwen was the servicer of the loan.
Brown presumably made payments on the loan from 2006 until 2010, but, according to a Notice of Intent to Foreclose dated July 31, 2013 and filed in the Foreclosure Proceeding, her last loan payment was received on March 30, 2010.
At some point during this period, Ocwen appears to have executed a Substitution of Trustee document that appointed several attorneys from the BWW Law Group, LLC ("BWW") as Deutsche Bank's substitute trustees. The Court's review of the public Circuit Court docket indicates that on November 15, 2013, BWW filed a foreclosure action in the Circuit Court of Prince George's County, Maryland. By February 18, 2014, BWW had served Brown, and on June 26, 2014, the Circuit Court ordered that Deutsche Bank could advertise the sale. The sale was scheduled for September 3, 2014. ECF No. 8-10. The day before the sale, Brown filed what was styled as a Rule 14-211 Motion to Stay Foreclosure Sale and Dismissal of Action. ECF No. 8-8. In it, she argued that BWW and Ocwen lacked standing to proceed with the foreclosure, that various documents were fraudulent, and that process had been insufficient. The Circuit Courtdenied Brown's Motion the next day, because it was untimely, because it failed to state a valid defense or argument, and because it failed to state a factual or legal basis for relief under Md. Rule 14-211(a)(3)(B). Deutsche Bank purchased the property that day at the foreclosure sale for $363,000. ECF No. 8-11.
On September 12, 2014, Brown filed a Second Motion to Stay the Foreclosure Sale in the Foreclosure Action. The Circuit Court denied this second motion on September 22, 2014, and ordered the foreclosure to continue in due course. On November 22, 2014, Brown filed exceptions to the sale, and about a week later, filed this action in this Court.
The Court's review of the Circuit Court Docket indicates that since that time, the Circuit Court has overruled Brown's exceptions to the foreclosure sale, and on March 3, 2015, issued an order ratifying the sale. Although Brown noticed an appeal to the Court of Special Appeals, on May 14, 2015, the Circuit Court also issued an order ratifying the report of the auditor, and closed the case.
Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 8(a) prescribes "liberal pleading standards," requiring only that a plaintiff submit a "short and plain statement of the claim showing that [he] is entitled to relief." Erickson v. Pardus, 551 U.S. 89, 94 (2007) (citing Fed. R. Civ. P. 8(a)(2)). If pleadings allege fraud or mistake, "a party must state with particularity the circumstances constituting fraud or mistake." Fed. R. Civ. P. 9(b). Under the heightened pleading standard of Rule 9(b), "[t]hese circumstances are 'the time, place, and contents of the false representations, as well as the identity of the person making the misrepresentation and what he obtained thereby.'" Weidman v. Exxon Mobil Corp., 776 F.3d 214, 219 (4th Cir. 2015) (quoting Harrison v. Westinghouse Savannah River Co., 176 F.3d 776, 784 (4th Cir. 1999)).
To survive a motion to dismiss under Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 12(b)(6), a plaintiff must plead facts sufficient to "state a claim to relief that is plausible on its face." Bell Atl. Corp. v. Twombly, 550 U.S. 544, 570 (2007). This standard requires "more than a sheer possibility that a defendant has acted unlawfully." Ashcroft v. Iqbal, 556 U.S. 662, 678 (2009). Although a court will accept factual allegations as true, "[t]hreadbare recitals of the elements of a cause of action, supported by mere conclusory statements do not suffice." Id.
While federal courts must liberally construe a pro se litigant's claims, this requirement "does not transform the court into an advocate." United States v. Wilson, 699 F.3d 789, 797 (4th Cir. 2012); see also Brown v. N.C. Dep't of Corr., 612 F.3d 720, 722 (4th Cir. 2010) (). The Fourth Circuit has noted that "[w]hile pro se complaints may 'represent the work of an untutored hand requiring special judicial solicitude,' a district court is not required to recognize 'obscure or extravagant claims defying the most concerted efforts to unravel them.'" Weller v. Dep't of Soc. Servs., 901 F.2d 387, 391 (4th Cir. 1990) (quoting Beaudett v. City of Hampton, 775 F.2d 1274, 1277 (4th Cir.1985), cert. denied, 475 U.S. 1088 (1986)).
Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 15(a)(2) instructs that the Court should freely give leave to amend a pleading when justice so requires. A motion to amend should be denied "only when the amendment would be prejudicial to the opposing party, there has been bad faith on the part of the moving party, or the amendment would be futile. HCMF Corp. v. Allen, 238 F.3d 273, 276 (4th Cir. 2001). If an amended complaint could not withstand a motion to dismiss, a motion to amend should be denied as futile. See Perkins v. United States, 55 F.3d 910, 917 (4th Cir. 1995).
Brown asserts four claims for relief that effectively seek to undo the Foreclosure Action by asserting that none of the Defendants is the valid holder of the note, and therefore none has a claim to the property or any right to foreclose.
The Court rejects these claims out of hand, all barred by the doctrine of res judicata.
In Count One (Lack of Standing/Wrongful Foreclosure), Brown contends that Defendants "do not have the right to foreclose on the Property because Defendants . . . have failed to perfect any security interest in the Property [and] [t]hus, the purported power of sale . . . no longer applies [and] Defendants . . . do not have the right to foreclose on the property." Compl. ¶ 56. She submits that the only parties who have standing to foreclose are the holders of the Note, who she contends are the "certificate holders of the securitized trust because they are the end users and pay taxes on their interest gains." Id. ¶ 57. She seeks damages and injunctive relief on this basis.5 In Count Eleven (Wrongful Foreclosure), she similarly asserts that the foreclosure was wrongful because there existed no secured party, and asks the Court to set aside the foreclosure and award her the full value of the property in the amount of $411,000.
In Count Six (Quiet Title), Brown asserts that none of the Defendants holds a perfected and secured claim in the property, or claims some interest in the property adverse to Brown's title, and that such claims constitute a cloud on Brown's title. Id. ¶¶...
To continue reading
Request your trial