Countrywide Sued Over Dead Man’s Home
Ticor Title, a mortgage title insurance company, has sued Countrywide over the title claim to a Chicago home that was reportedly bought and sold THREE TIMES during a period where the previous owner, Randy Johnson, sat mummified in a chair next to his dead dog.
The 2007 loan in question is a $360,000 first mortgage loan on a Victorian on the south side of Chi-town in which Tricor insured title. However, Ticor argues Countrywide was “reckless and grossly negligent in its underwriting of the mortgage.”
It seems that the owner Johnson had grown up in the house but seemingly dropped off the face of the earth in 2005. Cook County officials then discovered that a fraudulent deed had been backdated to 1996, which improperly transferred the property from Johnson’s deceased mother to a woman named Rhonda Evans. Evans then “sold” the house to a Donald Franklin who borrowed the money from Countrywide. The loan reportedly soon went into foreclosure and was then sold to another owner who discovered the bodies of Mr. Johnson and his loyal pet.
