On April 20, 2015, after a six-day trial at the Everett McKinley Dirksen United States Court House in Chicago, Illinois, Alena Hammer was awarded a total of $2 million in damages from Residential Credit Solutions, Inc. (RCS), a national mortgage loan servicer. Of the $2 million, $500,000 made up for compensatory damages while the remaining $1.5 million were punitive damages.
Hammer had resided in her home in DuPage County for the past 27 years. After entering a loan modification agreement, Hammer’s home mortgage loan was passed from the hands of one lender to the next, eventually landing in the hands of RCS.
At that point, Hammer began facing abuse from RCS. In 2010, they began rejecting her monthly payments and refusing to acknowledge the loan modification. Furthermore, RCS prosecuted two foreclosure actions against her despite Hammer’s consistency to pay for all monthly payments outlined in the loan modification agreement.
Hammer had no choice but to hire a lawyer to have the foreclosure actions terminated so her house would not be taken from her. In 2011, the foreclosure case was dismissed. Unfortunately, the rejection of her payments and failure to acknowledge her loan modification continued. Again in 2011, RCS filed a foreclosure action which Hammer was forced to endure from 2011 to 2013.
Hammer filed a lawsuit against RCS complaining of two and half years of inaccurate fees assessed to her loan account, the costs to defend the two unnecessary foreclosure actions, mental and emotional distresses, and other damages.
On April 20, 2015, the federal trial concluded. Hammer was compensated for RCS’s following actions:
- Breach of contract
- Violations of the Real Estate Settlement Procedures Act
- Violations of unfairness and deception provisions of the Illinois Consumer Fraud
- Violations of the Deceptive Business Practices Act
- Punitive damages
The Chicago consumer lawyers that defended Hammer through her case were Nicholas Heath Wooten, Esq., Ross Michael Zambon, Esq., and Mara Ann Baltabols, Esq., two of which practice at the Atlas Consumer Law
To read the full article regarding Hammer’s case, click here.