F'closure Mill Scores Win In Sloppy Paperwork Case; Dodges Contempt Charges After Invoking "Pure Heart-Empty Head" Defense; Judge Allows Case Refiling

In Miami, Florida, The Palm Beach Post reports:

• A Miami-Dade County Circuit Court judge is withholding a finding of contempt against attorney Marc Ben-Ezra but issued sanctions Wednesday requiring his firm to clean up its foreclosure practices.
• Ben-Ezra, founding partner of Fort Lauderdale-based Ben-Ezra & Katz, was held in contempt by Judge Maxine Cohen Lando during a February hearing where she criticized the firm for "shoddy" and "grossly negligent" foreclosure work. But in a four-page order issued Wednesday, Lando said subsequent briefings and hearings have softened her stance.
• "The court appreciates Mr. Ben-Ezra's expressed desire to change his firm's procedures as expressed to the court by Compliance Counsel Daniel Gelber and, as stated above, will withhold a finding of contempt upon either the firm or Mr. Ben-Ezra," Lando wrote.(1)

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• Lando's sanctions against the firm include requiring that cases be assigned to specific attorneys and that attorneys come to court prepared. She set a July 8 hearing to review the firm's progress. Lando's order also requires Ben-Ezra & Katz to pay defense attorney Maria Mussari $12,982 in attorney's fees and costs.
• Mussari, who represented the homeowner in the case that Lando originally found Ben-Ezra in contempt on, said the foreclosure was dismissed but may be refiled. During the February hearing, Lando said she was barring it from being refiled, but Mussari said the judge has reconsidered that ruling.(2)

For more, see Attorney's contempt finding withheld, law firm dropping its foreclosure operations.

(1) Ben-Ezra won the day here with his successful invocation of the "pure heart and empty head defense" in an attempt to minimize any possible sanctions for his firm's sloppy work, despite such a defense is generally looked upon by the courts with disfavor. See, for example, Warner v. Hillcrest Medical Center, 914 P.2d 1060 (Okla. Ct. Civ. App. 1995), stating:

• "Whether or not the acts of an attorney are done in good faith is no longer the test."`[T]he new test represents an intentional abandonment of the subjective focus of [§ 2011] in favor of an objective one.' `Simply put, subjective good faith no longer provides the safe harbor it once did.' `There is no room for a pure heart, empty head defense under [§ 2011].'" First National Bank and Trust Company of Vinita v. Kissee, 859 P.2d 502, 512 (Okla. 1993) (footnotes omitted). "Rule 11 requires lawyers to think first and file later, on pain of personal liability." Stewart v. RCA Corp., 790 F.2d 624, 633 (7th Cir. 1986).

(2) See:

• "The Eleventh Judicial Circuit Does Not Have A Rocket Docket!" Says Judge As She Dismisses Foreclosure Action, Cancels Debt Over Sloppy Paperwork,
• Head Of Florida Foreclosure Mill Ordered Into Court To Explain Dubious Document Filings In Recently-Dismissed Suit.

It may be that Judge Lando went off the deep end a bit too far when originally cancelling the foreclosing lender's debt due to the Ben-Ezra firm's screw-ups and had second thoughts when she regained her senses reconsidered her earlier ruling.