New York’s bid for a court order forcing Wells Fargo to comply with a mortgage-servicing settlement should be denied because the state is ignoring terms of the $25 billion agreement, the bank said.
New York Attorney General Eric Schneiderman is attempting to make an “end-run” around the mechanism for testing whether banks are complying with the settlement and for fixing violations, Wells Fargo said in a filing Friday in federal court in Washington.
“The entire agreed-upon enforcement process—which was precisely intended to avoid costly litigation—would be rendered a nullity” if the state’s claims are allowed to proceed, the lender said.
Schneiderman claims San Francisco-based Wells Fargo violated the 2012 settlement by subjecting homeowners to delays and obstructions in the process for modifying mortgage loans. Wells Fargo was among five mortgage servicers that reached the agreement with the U.S. and 49 states.
