Banking and financial services

BLF has represented banks and other financial services clients in multi-million dollar disputes, many of which have involved fraud by third parties.

BLF has developed particular expertise in the field of mortgage financing, including warehouse lending and secondary market transactions. BLF also has experience in collections from commercial entities, from judgment to liquidation of commercial and guarantor assets.

Our representative engagements in this area include:

• Representing a national bank in an unfair competition case involving claims against the client’s competitor and the client’s former employees. The former employees went over to the competitor en masse, taking with them reams of information regarding the client’s customers. The client’s claims included misappropriation of trade secrets, conversion, breach of contract, breach of fiduciary duty, tortious interference with contract, conspiracy and other causes of action. Shortly after filing the case, BLF negotiated a Preliminary Injunction Consent Order, which required the defendants to return to the client all the information they had taken from it. After discovery and motion practice, the parties entered into a confidential settlement on the client’s damages claim.
• BLF was retained to assist its client, a lender to an insolvent mortgage banker, in recovering some of its losses from another lender. Both lenders had been defrauded by the mortage banker. However, discovery showed that the defendant lender had been reducing its losses by misappropriating the proceeds of BLF's client's loans. Following BLF's deposition of the defendant's expert, in which the witness admitted a serious error, BLF negotiated a settlement that enabled its client to recover all of the monies misappropriated by the other lender.
• Obtaining an award of summary judgment for a large bank, which had been sued for millions of dollars for an alleged failure to satisfy mortgages on plaintiff’s property. The trial court ruled for the bank on the grounds that the claimant had not disclosed those claims to his creditors in a series of earlier bankruptcy proceedings and was therefore barred from pursuing them. A second basis for summary judgment was the statute of limitations. The Third Circuit affirmed.
• Winning a judgment for a bank client sued by defaulted loan borrowers for violations of the Equal Credit Opportunity Act. On BLF’s motion on behalf of the bank, the federal district court dismissed the borrowers’ claims, granted a judgment on the bank’s counterclaims for the amount of defaulted loans, and awarded the bank a full reimbursement for BLF’s attorney’s fees.

Representative cases:

Hudson United Bank v. JVC Contracting, et al. (Phila. Cty. Common Pleas 2005); In re JVC (Bankr. E.D. Pa 2007). BLF obtained a substantial recovery for our client, a bank which held a secured and guaranteed lien against assets that were subject to competing claims. ... Read More

Estate of Ortlieb v. Hudson United Bank (3d Cir. 2005). BLF obtained a summary judgment for the defendant bank, on plaintiff's claim seeking damages for failure to mark his mortgages satisfied. ... Read More

Wayside Tavern, Inc., et al. v. Hudson United Bank, et al. (E.D. Pa. 2005). BLF obtained a favorable settlement for the defendant bank in this case concerning the validity of execution of a power of attorney. ... Read More

Hudson United Bank v. Feld, et al. (E.D. Pa. 2004). BLF utilized the Pennsylvania and New Jersey collection law to maximize recovery for BLF's client, Hudson United Bank ... Read More