‘Disregard’ of Firmly Established ‘Disclosure’ Requirements: Feds
‘Permanently Blocked,’ Bankruptcy Court Declares, Orders
In Wake of U.S. Trustee Program Probe of CA Enterprises: DOJ Press Statement
‘Unscrupulous bankruptcy petition preparers prey on vulnerable debtors,’ official asserts
By JOSH MITCHELL
Editor
River Mississippi News
MARYLAND VIA MISSISSIPPI REPORTING SITE — Two people who worked through bankruptcy processes with U.S.-based filers who’ve lost financial footing to keep their homes afloat have been cut off from providing bankruptcy services due to their inability to competently deliver such services, primarily due to not having the necessary legal documents to assist in such real estate cases coupled with their “disregard” for established “disclosure requirements,” according to the Department of Justice.
This case is being handled as an enforcement matter by the Justice Department’s U.S. Trustee Program, a DOJ news release issued Wednesday states.
The case is based on an order from a Maryland bankruptcy court that “permanently” blocks “CA Enterprises, doing business as Premier Services and Premier Legal Services, from operating in the district.” The order forbidding CA Enterprises from servicing the affected area “a complaint filed by the U.S. Trustee’s office in Greenbelt, Maryland, and required Premier to refund $2,000 to the debtor in the case.”
Similar cases in nearby states have also been on court calendars recently, including a Jan. 26 case in the Bankruptcy Court for the Eastern District of Virginia, according to the DOJ release.
This case “permanently enjoined Malynda Perez-Combs from operating in that jurisdiction.”
Perez-Combs declined defending herself against another “complaint filed by the U.S. Trustee’s office in Norfolk, Va.,” but she was fined $15,000 made to return $300 in fees and pay $2,000 in statutory damages to the debtor” in the Jan. 26 case, the release adds.
“Unscrupulous bankruptcy petition preparers prey on vulnerable debtors,” said Tara Twomey, who directs the Executive Office for U.S. Trustees.
Director Twomey added that that broader goal of ongoing enforcement is “to keep fraudsters and scammers out of the bankruptcy system.”
Established U.S. Bankruptcy Code “strictly regulates the services of bankruptcy petition preparers, commonly known as BPPs. BPPs are not attorneys, cannot give legal advice or practice law and generally are limited to typing information provided by debtors into bankruptcy forms for the debtors to file.
“The Code requires BPPs to disclose information about their fees and their services to the debtors and to the bankruptcy court,” the news release goes on to state.
The bankruptcy cases called into question involve problems such as a person seeking debt relief submitting documents to the Premier firm only for the “mortgage lender” to email the indebted client “a completed chapter 13 bankruptcy petition and Social Security verification form and instructed her to file them with the bankruptcy court.”
Likewise, the Virginia case involved the firm hiring “Perez-Combs to prepare her bankruptcy documents,” the release states, adding, “Perez-Combs recommended filing a case under chapter 7 and repeatedly provided other impermissible legal advice and engaged in the unauthorized practice of law.”
Perez-Combs practiced this form of unqualified law in various ways, such as by categorizing “debtor’s assets and liabilities” in certain ways “on the bankruptcy schedules,” including taking part in the handpicking of “selected exemptions that were legally inapplicable,” the news release explains further.
Perez-Combs who, according to DOJ officials, has a solidly established pattern of “similar conduct in other cases in other jurisdictions,” did not even effort a defense against the “U.S. Trustee’s complaint,” the release shows.
