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Class action suit against Ohio BMV over bogus lamination fees continues, plaintiffs who received postcards don’t need to do anything to remain part of the class

Attorneys

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If you received a postcard regarding the Madyda v. BMV case, it is because you are one of the people who paid a fee to have your driver’s licensed laminated by a deputy registrar between 2018 and 2020, even though the deputy registrars were not performing the service.

That makes you a member of the class of plaintiffs in the lawsuit DannLaw has filed against the BMV and the state of Ohio. If you would like to remain in the class and receive a portion of any funds or other compensation we recover on behalf of the plaintiffs you do not need to do anything. If you prefer to bring your own claim against the BMV, the postcard contains instructions for opting out.

Again, you do not need to do anything if you want to continue to be a member of the class. DannLaw will provide regular updates as the case proceeds.

Here is a detailed description of the case:

DannLaw files class action suit against Ohio Bureau of Motor vehicles to recover $3 million in bogus fees charged by deputy registrars

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Since July 2, 2018, the Ohio Bureau of Motor Vehicles (BMV) has allowed the state’s 200 deputy registrars to charge people obtaining or renewing driver’s licenses or state-issued I.D.s a $1.50 lamination fee even though the registrars were no longer producing—or laminating—the cards on site. As a result, an estimated two million Ohioans have been charged $3 million for a service that was not performed.

Catherine Turcer, executive director of Common Cause Ohio, told the Columbus Dispatch the registrars should not be pocketing the fee. “Clearly, the registrars should not be charging for something they are not providing … that’s not fair. Many of us don’t think about a buck fifty, it’s not a big deal. But it is a big deal when you think about being charged extra fees for no reason. We want to spend our money on what we expected.”

Attorney Marc Dann, founder of the Cleveland-based consumer protection law firm DannLaw agrees with Ms. Turcer. And, if the messages that have been pouring into the firm’s Facebook page are any indication, so do people who paid the bogus fee. “We posted an item on our Facebook page asking anyone who has renewed their license or state I.D. since last July to contact us,” the former Ohio attorney general said. “The response was overwhelming. Those who paid the fee were outraged. They want their money back and they want the state to stop ripping people off.”

Today the legal team at DannLaw took the first step toward recovering the unwarranted fees by filing a class action suit against the BMV in the Ohio Court of Claims. The suit asks the Court to award anyone who paid the lamination fee $1.50 plus interest. The complaint may be read/downloaded here:Madyda Alexander 2019 03 19 Complaint – Lamination Fee INITIAL DRAFT (002)

“While the dollar amount on a per-person basis may be small, there’s nothing trivial about the BMV allowing the registrars to pocket $3 million for doing nothing,” Atty. Dann said. “If everyone shrugs their shoulders and says ‘it’s only a buck fifty’ does that mean it’s ok for the state to grab five dollars or ten dollars from its citizens? Where do you draw the line? At its core, this case isn’t about the $1.50, it’s about holding government officials accountable for their actions. That’s the best way to ensure that something like this doesn’t happen again.”

According to Atty. Joe Romano of Bay Village, Ohio who is serving as co-counsel on the case the overcharges stem from the fact that in order to comply with federal regulations the BMV itself rather than the registrars began producing and mailing the licenses and I.D. cards last July. “Apparently, and this is something we hope to learn more about as the case progresses, neither the deputy registrars nor the staff at the BMV noticed that people were still being charged the $1.50 lamination fee even though the registrars weren’t laminating a darn thing,” he said.

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Dann Law

Hello and Happy Spring. I’m reaching out today to provide our clients and friends with updates about several pending cases, new investigations and an exciting new addition to the DannLaw legal team. 

First I would like to introduce and welcome Jeff Crossman to DannLaw. Jeff, who recently joined DannLaw after serving in the Ohio House and running for Ohio Attorney General, will be litigating complex class action, mortgage servicing, and corporate/business cases. 

Picture of Jeff CrossmanJeff brings more than two decades of legal experience to Dann Law.  During his career, he has represented a variety of clients in complex matters, successfully resolving disputes for both individuals and businesses ranging from small startups to national corporations.  Jeff has served as an associate with a prominent national law firm, as in-house legal counsel for multiple national companies, and recently served two terms as a member of the Ohio House of Representatives where he gained invaluable experience in public policy, government, and changes made to the legal system. The sum of Jeff’s experience has given him a unique perspective and a deep understanding of the legal landscape, which he leverages to achieve the best outcomes for his clients.

Jeff believes that every client deserves high-quality legal representation personalized to fit the client’s needs, and he is committed to achieving the best possible outcomes for each and every one of his clients.

Education

  • B.A. University of Mount Union
  • M.A., University of Akron
  • J.D., Cleveland-Marshall College of Law, magna cum laude

Bar Admissions

  • State of Ohio
  • Federal District Court for the Northern District of Ohio
  • Pending: Federal District Court for the Southern District of Ohio 
  • 6th Circuit Court of Appeals.

 Mortgage Servicing Litigation

Our Mortgage Servicing Litigation team, which includes Dan Solar, Michael Smith, Saher Chaudrey, Javier Merino, Brian Flick, Kim White, and Karen Ortiz, continue to bring groundbreaking cases on behalf of homeowners involved in disputes with their mortgage servicers:

  1. Delays  and mistakes made by servicers assisting homeowners who took advantage of Covid Related Mortgage Payment Forbearance provided by the CARES Act and the American Recovery Act.  As a result of these errors, many borrowers exited forbearance with higher interest rates than they should have and some are facing unnecessary and unwarranted foreclosure actions. 
  2. Homeowners put at risk because servicers mishandled tax, insurance, and other escrow payments.. 
  3. Problems that have occurred when mortgage servicing is transferred from one company to another. This problem is especially prevalent when borrowers and services are engaged in loss mitigation activities. 
  4. Accounting problems following the successful completion of a Chapter 13 bankruptcy. 
  5. Violations of Ohio’s Residential Mortgage Loan Act. Dannlaw has obtained numerous consumer/borrower favorable court decisions involving servicers who failed to abide by changes in the Ohio Law that protects borrowers.

Foreclosure Defense

As foreclosure protections sunset our Foreclosure Defense team led by Whitney Kaster with support from Amanda Severt, Karen Ortiz and Roberto Rivera are litgating cases and developing thoughtful and innovative loss mitigation and legal strategies that will enable our clients to stay in their homes. If you are or may be about to enter foreclosure, please contact form or call us at 216-373-0539. We are here to help.

Class Action Lawsuits 

The members of our class action practice group, Brian Flick, Javier Merino, Andy Wolf, Jeff Crossman, Saher Chaudrey,Kim White and Liza Marigliano are pleased and proud to report that they have worked with co-counsel to obtain preliminary approval of several class action cases across the United States in the past several months.  There are active claim deadlines in the following cases.  If you believe you are a member of the class in one or some of these actions, we encourage you to visit the case settlement websites to review the terms of settlement and if appropriate files a claim: .

Nationstar

In the Class Action case against Nationstar Mortgage and payment processor ACI we successfully negotiated a $9 million settlement that is set for final approval on May 31, 2023 in the Federal District Court in North Carolina. You still have  time to submit claims if Nationstar pulled money from your bank account without permission in April of 2021. Visit this website to make a claim https://achloanpaymentlitigation.com/.

Michigan Ave. Immediate Care

Michigan Avenue Immediate Care  has agreed to a $900,000 settlement fund for people whose personal information was exposed to the dark web as the result of a data breach. If you were a patient of the of that Chicago medical practice file a claim here:  https://www.maicincident.com/

Parker Hannifin

We’ve reached a favorable $1.75 Million  settlement for present and past employees of Parker Hannifin who were impacted by a data breach. If you ever worked at Parker Hannifin please follow this link to learn more and file a claim www.phdatasettlement.com.

We are also investigating and litigating several other significant class action cases including:

Pricing Fraud by Dollar General.  DannLaw has filed cases against Dollar General in Ohio, New York and New Jersey based on allegations that prices listed for items on shelves are lower than prices charged at the register. If you live anywhere in the United States and believe you have been overcharged by Dollar General or any other retailer, please contact our office by completing and submitting our contact form or calling 216-373-0539.

Salmonella Poisoning in Jif Peanut Butter 

The FDA, along with CDC and state and local partners are investigating a multistate outbreak of Salmonella Senftenberg infections linked to certain Jif brand peanut butter products produced at the J.M. Smucker Company facility in Lexington, Kentucky. If you believe you have been impacted by the outbreak please complete and submit our contact form or call us at 216-373-0539.

Traffic Camera Violations in the City of Girard

Tickets were wrongly issued to drivers along Rt 80 in Girard Ohio

Impact Cases

Federal Government’s failure to compensate victims of  “Snap Skimming”  DannLaw recently filed a case in Ohio against the United States Department of Agriculture regarding the agency’s failure to reimburse Ohioans whose SNAP benefits have been “skimmed” by unknown third parties beginning in January of 2022. 

Skimming occurs when criminals use a device placed over a point-of-sale card reader to steal information from payment cards like SNAP EBT and cash assistance cards. That means SNAP or cash assistance benefits may have been stolen with the cardholder’s knowledge.

If you believe you have been a victim of SNAP theft, please please complete and submit our contact form or call us at 216-373-0539.

Racial Discrimination in Mortgage Lending by Wells Fargo We have assumed a  leadership role in investigating allegations that Wells denied  borrowers of color mortgage financing at a rate almost double that of white borrowers.. 

Ohio PUA Unemployment Benefits

In Bowling v. Dewine we continue to pursue $900 million in fully federally-funded COVID-19 supplemental unemployment insurance benefits the DeWine administration callously denied Ohioans who were left jobless as a result of the Coronavirus pandemic. 

Data Breach Cases

We are also bringing Class Actions for Data Breaches against the following Companies:

Last Pass/GoTo Technologies

Carrington Mortgage and Alvaria, Inc.

Snap Finance–Brian Flick has been appointed co-lead counsel

Key Bank/KeyBank Mortgage/Fulton Bank/Overby-Seawell

Samsung

Bet MGM (Where Javier Merino is taking a Lead Role)

Lakeview Loan Servicing

If you or someone you know has been impacted by these data breaches please complete and submit our contact form or call us at 216-373-0539.

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Ocwen logo
Ocwen/PHH: The bad guys who tried to steal Riad Ghosheh’s home. Nearly 12,000 consumers have lodged complaints about the company with the CFPB.

In 2010 Kim Naimoli of Geneva, New York who was struggling to make her mortgage payments in the wake of the 2007-2008 collapse of the housing market, applied for a loan modification under the provisions of the federal Home Affordable Modification Program (HAMP). Over the next six years Ms. Naimoli did everything right: she completed and returned forms, complied with document requests, made her house payments on time, and, in accordance with the law, filed a “Notice of Error” (NOE) when Ocwen the company that was servicing her loan made mistakes.

During that same period Ocwen, now known as PHH, did everything wrong. The company failed to register mortgage documents, refused to abide by the terms of the loan modification agreement it had approved, did not acknowledge or respond to correspondence from Ms. Naimoli or her legal counsel, began refusing to accept her mortgage payments, revoked the loan mod agreement, and rejected an NOE requesting that the firm correct its blatant errors.

In 2017 DannLaw, one of the nation’s leading consumer protection law firms, sued Ocwen/PHH on Ms. Naimoli’s behalf in the Federal District Court for the Western District of New York alleging the company had committed multiple violations of the federal Real Estate Sales Practices Act (RESPA). In April of 2020 Judge Elizabeth A. Wolford granted the company’s motion for summary judgement and dismissed the case.

DannLaw immediately appealed and, in what DannLaw founder and former Ohio Attorney General Marc Dann hailed as a major victory for homeowners, the United States Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit reversed Judge Wolford and held that Ocwen/PHH had indeed violated the law. According to Dann the decision, handed down on January 7, 2022, will have wide-ranging impact on the mortgage servicing industry because the New York City-based Second Circuit is one of the most influential courts in the federal judicial system.

The significance of the case is underscored by the fact that the judges asked the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau to a file a brief after oral argument. In the brief the CFPB essentially supported DannLaw’s position.

Javier Merino, leader of the DannLaw team that litigated the case said Ocwen/PHH never denied engaging in the conduct that nearly cost Ms. Naimoli her home. “The record is clear: the company made numerous errors, would not correct them, and then used their mistakes as justification for walking away from the loan mod they had previously approved,” he said. “Once we got them into court, they contended that because their admitted misdeeds were related to the denial of the loan mod and not mortgage servicing they weren’t covered by RESPA. Fortunately, the Second Circuit saw through that specious argument and ruled in our favor.” The decision may be viewed here.

“Ocwen/PHH is perennially ranked among the worst mortgage servicers in the U.S. so I’m certainly not surprised that their bad acts served as a catalyst for this landmark decision,” Marc Dann noted. “I find it both incredibly satisfying and ironic that the company’s persistent and willful violations of the law will strengthen and expand the protections offered by RESPA and benefit homeowners who are too often abused by the mortgage servicing industry.”

Dann said the case, which took years to move through the courts, demonstrates the importance of RESPA’s fee-shifting provisions which balance the legal playing field. “Contingency fee arrangements ensure that homeowners like Ms. Naimoli have the opportunity to seek and secure justice and receive the financial compensation they need and deserve,” he said. “They enable plaintiff’s law firms like ours to stand toe-to-toe with and defeat the white shoe law firms that represent the financial services industry case after case, year after year.”

Dann also said the case illustrates why borrowers must document in writing and preserve all communications and interactions they have with lenders. “The records Ms. Naimoli retained, including delivery receipts and originals and copies of all correspondence, allowed us to present clear and convincing evidence of Ocwen/PHH’s conduct to the Court. The value of those records and the role they played in our victory cannot be understated.”

For more information please contact Marc Dann at 216-373-0539 or email mdann@dannlaw.com

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Marc Dann and Brian Flick of DannLaw, one of the nation’s leading consumer protection law firms and Attorney Andrew Engel of Advocate Attorneys, LLP, today filed suit in Cuyahoga County Common Pleas Court to force Governor Mike DeWine and Matt Damschroeder, Director of the Ohio Department of Jobs and Family Services to rescind their decision to terminate Ohio’s participation in the Federal Pandemic Unemployment Compensation (FPUC), Pandemic Unemployment Assistance (PUA),  Pandemic Emergency Unemployment Compensation (PEUC) programs. The first hearing in the case has been set for July 21, 2021 at 1:30 P.M. before Judge Michael P. Shaughnessy in Courtroom 16 C in the Cuyahoga County Justice Center, 1200 Ontario St, Cleveland, OH.

DeWine and Damschroder announced on May 13, 2021 that the federally-funded benefits would be cutoff on June 26, 2021. Ohio is one of 27 states governed by Republicans that decided to terminate the benefits early.

“Along with jeopardizing the personal and financial well-being of Ohioans who are struggling to recover from the pandemic, DeWine and Damschroder’s callous and politically-motivated decision to terminate the federal benefits represents a willful and blatant violation of Ohio law,” Brian Flick said.

According to the lawsuit, Ohio Revised Code Section ORC 4141.43(I) requires Damschroder to

“…cooperate with the United States department of labor to the fullest extent…[and] take such action…as may be necessary to secure to this state and its citizens all advantages available under the provisions of the “Social Security Act” that relate to unemployment compensation…”

The mandamus action asks the Cuyahoga County Common Pleas Court to:

  • Declare Governor Dewine and Director Damschroder to be in violation of their statutory duties under R.C. 4141.43(I) by terminating Ohio’s participation in PUA, PEUC, and FUPC benefits as of the week of June 26, 2021;
  • Enjoin Dewine, Damschroder, their officers, employees, and agents, from withdrawing the State of Ohio from unemployment benefits offered through the CARES Act;
  • Order Dewine and Damschroder to immediately notify the United States Department of Labor of Ohio will participate in the programs for their duration;
  • Issue a peremptory writ of mandamus requiring the Defendants’ perform their statutory duties required by ORC 4141.43(I) and immediately take all action necessary to reinstate Ohio’s participation in all federal unemployment insurance benefit available from the United States Department of Labor.

DannLaw and Advocate Attorneys are also seeking a Temporary Restraining Order and Preliminary Injunction enjoining Dewine and Damschroder from denying Ohioans

the right to receive FPUC benefits.

The mandamus action may be viewed here: Bowling Candy 2021 07 06 First Amended Complaint TO FILE

The motion for a temporary restraining order may be viewed here: Bowling Candy 2021 07 05 Motion for TRO Final

Similar suits have been filed in three other states: Indiana, Maryland, and Texas. On June 25 Indiana Superior Court Judge John Hanley ruled that the state must continue paying the benefits and said “Indiana law recognizes the importance of these benefits. Indiana law requires the State to accept these benefits.” Court action is pending in Maryland and Texas.

“Indiana’s statutory language is very similar to Ohio’s,” Atty. Dann noted. “We believe we are right on the law an absolutely right as it relates to public policy that protects the interests of the people of the state of Ohio.”

For more information, please contact Atty. Marc Dann at 216-373-0539 or by emailing mdann@dannlaw.com