John Hundley

A party must read the actual notice of lis pendens and may not rely upon an erroneous summary
thereof provided by a recorder of deeds, a panel in the Appellate Court’s First District has held.

A mortgagor who is properly served, who receives notices of the default, the judgment of foreclosure and the sale, who participates in the proceedings, but who waits 10 months after the default judgment before seeking to vacate same and to raise pleading defects, may not have the judgment and sale vacated even under the liberal rules of 735 ILCS 5/2-1301(e), the Illlinois Supreme Court held recently.

A complaint which alleges wrongs against multiple defendants collectively, without details about who did what, fails the requirement of plausibility which Supreme Court cases have imported into Federal Rules of Civil Procedure 12(b)(6), the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Seventh Circuit has held.

A respondent that has frozen an account in response to a citation to discover assets is entitled to unfreeze that account upon receipt of an order “the most reasonable reading of which” unfreezes the account, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Seventh Circuit has held.

Just because an organizational employer is in financial trouble does not absolve its managers of potential personal liability under the Illinois Wage Payment and Collection Act, 820 ILCS 115 (“IWPCA”), if they “have discretion to pay plaintiff but cho[o]se to allocate resources elsewhere,” according to a recent decision of the Appellate Court’s Second District.

Look for increased attempts to discover those intake forms used by bankruptcy practitioners – and also fee information for all lawyers – as a result of a recent decision by the Seventh Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals.

A mortgagee’s violation of 735 ILCS 5/15-1508(d-5) and of the Housing Affordable Mortgage Program
(“HAMP”) rules may require denial of confirmation of a foreclosure sale held in violation of those rules, a
panel in the Appellate Court’s Second District has held.

A “mortgage rescue” victim’s argument that an apparent warranty deed should be construed as an equitable mortgage should have gone forward to a full trial, a panel of the Appellate Court’s First District has held.

Mere withdrawal when a client persists in utilizing false material evidence, without disclosure thereof to the tribunal in a civil matter, ordinarily is improper even if the lawyer had no role in creating or presenting the false evidence, an Illinois State Bar Association committee has opined.