Excerpt from: Huffington Post (click for full article)
Florida's highest court has ruled a homeowner cannot re-open a
voluntarily dismissed foreclosure case despite allegations that the
bank falsified documents, giving a win to banks in a closely watched
ruling that could have affected thousands of cases in a state hit hard
by the foreclosure crisis.
The Florida Supreme
Court had been asked to decide whether banks accused of using
fraudulent documents to file foreclosure lawsuits could dismiss the
cases, and then later re-file them with different paperwork.
On Thursday, the Florida Supreme Court decided that it could not,
unless the plaintiff - in this case, the bank - had obtained some kind
of affirmative relief, and the dismissal had kept the fraud from being
remedied by the court.
However, the court
acknowledged the "multiple abuses that can occur from fraudulent
pleadings," and asked Florida's bar association to review civil
litigation rules to determine if changes should be made to address the
issue.
A lawyer for Pino, Amanda Lundergan of the
Ice Firm, said she believed the ruling "will have the unintended
effect of encouraging underhanded tactics" by plaintiffs in foreclosure
and other cases.
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