Tip for Title Insurers

The tip for title insurers is to stop insuring title for Oakland County real estate that has a sheriff deed signed between April 1, 2009-December 31, 2012. Why? Because Oakland County Sheriff Mike Bouchard rigged a contract to go to some of his friends who also happened to be deputies at the Oakland County Sheriff’s Office. This violated Michigan law regarding employee conflict of interest and federal law regarding conspiracy and perjury before a federal judge. The evidence was part of an Oakland County Circuit Court case, New Jerusalem Deliverance Church v. Evangelical Christian Credit Union, case number 11-119411-CH, Judge Daniel Patrick O’Brien presiding. The case is currently on appeal, COA case number 309571.

In summary, New Jerusalem is arguing that the sheriff deed foreclosing upon its Pontiac church building is invalid because the sheriff deed was signed by a special deputy who was not properly appointed by the sheriff.

• The special deputy who signed their sheriff deed was Thomas Rabette, an attorney. Prior to 2009, Rabette served as a marine special deputy.

• In early January 2009, Rabette was the attorney who filed the articles of incorporation for American Process Service, Inc., (APS). John Roehrig was the incorporator, but Rabette’s wife, Judith Boaks, a CPA, was the registered agent for APS.

• Later in January 2009, the contract for civil processing for the sheriff’s office went up for bid. The new company, APS, won the bid.

• Sheriff Bouchard and the chairman of the Oakland County Board of Commissioners in April 2009, Bill Bullard, signed the contract. Usually, for a chairperson to sign a contract on behalf of the entire group of elected officials, the group must vote on the contract. New Jerusalem argued that Michigan’s conflict of interest laws required that the elected officials approve the contract via a 2/3 vote recorded in the minutes of a noticed public meeting. Nowhere in the 2009 minutes of the Oakland County Board of Commissioners is recorded a vote on the civil process servicing contract.

• In 2010, APS submitted an annual report that lists Rabette as the registered agent. In addition to John Roehrig, the annual report also lists Rabette and another Oakland County Sheriff’s Office deputy, Roger St. Jean, as officers of APS.

• Thomas Rabette, his wife Judith Boaks, Roger St. Jean and his wife Linda, and John Roehrig each contributed the statutory maximum to Bouchard’s failed gubernatorial campaign. New Jerusalem argued that these campaign contributions served as pay-to-play for Bouchard rigging the civil process service contract to APS. In total, APS officers contributed $17,000 to Mike Bouchard’s 2010 campaign to become the governor of Michigan.

• New Jerusalem therefore argued before Judge O’Brien and on appeal that, not only did Bouchard and Bullard misappropriate millions in taxpayers’ funds, but that the sheriff deed is invalid because Oakland County’s civil process servicing contract with APS is null and void. By implication, all the Oakland County foreclosure sales since 2009 are invalid if APS employees conducted the sheriff sale.

• New Jerusalem accused Thomas Rabette of committing perjury before federal judge Robert H. Cleland in an affidavit submitted in New Jerusalem’s predecessor federal case, case #10-cv-12566. In Rabette’s affidavit, he said that he was never contemporaneously employed by both the sheriff’s office and American Process Service. Rabette’s affidavit contradicts Bouchard’s April 1, 2009 appointments in which Rabette was appointed both a reserve special deputy employed by the sheriff’s office and a civil process service special deputy employed by American Process Service.

Of course, I wouldn’t expect title insurers to deny insurance coverage for an entire county’s foreclosed properties without proof of the cloud in the chain of titles. Moreover, if title insurers incur any losses due to clouds on title from invalid sheriff deeds, title insurers would need evidence to recover their losses from Rabette’s bond and insurance. 

For a copy of the evidence that is or has been before the courts, title insurers can use the case numbers provided above in order to download the documents from the courts.  Be advised that the courts charge for copies of their documents.  The most complete set of evidence could be found in the Oakland County Circuit Court case.  The link to its website is http://www.oakgov.com/clerkrod/pages/courtexplorer.aspx .  However, Oakland County charges $1.00 per page for court documents.  There are over 300 pages of documents, thus title insurers could pay more than $300 to Oakland County for copies of the documents.  Alternatively, New Jerusalem’s attorney, Arthur C. Kirkland Jr., can provide a digital copy from his work product for $200.  To purchase a copy, please click on the button below.

Title Insurers’ Ebook of Bouchard’s Corruption

Hearing on Evidence that Bouchard & Bullard Misappropriated Oakland County Funds

Pontiac, Michigan – As part of a case to set aside a foreclosure, a Pontiac church submitted evidence to Oakland County Circuit Judge Daniel Patrick O’Brien that Sheriff Mike Bouchard and former Oakland County Board of Commissioners Chairperson Bill Bullard Jr. signed a controversial contract without the approval of the Board of Commissioners. As a result, since April 2009, more than $2.8 million in Oakland County taxpayer funds have been going to American Process Service Inc., without lawful authorization. Bill Bullard Jr. is now the Oakland County Clerk and Register of Deeds.

The news about Bouchard and Bullard’s misappropriation of taxpayer funds was first reported on WCHB talk radio journalist Mildred Gaddis’ Morning Show on January 26, 2012. See the write-up of Attorney Arthur C. Kirkland’s interview on the Mildred Gaddis show at http://wchbnewsdetroit.com/detroit/mildredgaddis/public-corruption-in-the-oakland-county-sheriff%E2%80%99s-office-exposed-by-foreclosure-case/

On February 15, 2012 at 8:30 a.m. EST, Judge Daniel Patrick O’Brien will be ruling on the evidence that Sheriff Mike Bouchard and others violated laws that prohibit conflicts of interest, contract bid rigging, pay-to-pay/kickbacks, perjury, misconduct in office, and now, misappropriation of taxpayer funds. This evidence was filed on January 25-27, 2012 in New Jerusalem Deliverance Church v. Evangelical Christian Credit Union, case number 11-119411-CH. The public is invited to attend the hearing that will be held at the Oakland County Circuit Courthouse, 1200 North Telegraph, in Pontiac, Michigan.

Copies of the documents supporting New Jerusalem’s allegations of public corruption are published on http://www.docstoc.com. For more information, please contact Anita Belle, legal assistant to New Jerusalem’s attorney Arthur C. Kirkland Jr., at 313-740-4644.

Eviction By Any Means Necessary, Including By Invalid Sheriff Deeds

We tell children all the time that one person can make a difference, both for good and for bad.

A person who could be making the difference for bad is Oakland County Sheriff Mike Bouchard. He wanted to be Governor of Michigan. Nothing illegal about that. However, another thing we tell children is that the end doesn’t always justify the means, especially if the means by which you raise campaign finances is through kickbacks from pay-to-play schemes.

The case of New Jerusalem Deliverance Church was published recently. (See link: http://voiceofdetroit.net/?p=7043)

Robert Joyce, Bishop of New Jerusalem Deliverance Church, the 'private attorney general'

An example of one woman making a difference for good is Diane Bukowski. The Voice of Detroit is an independent newspaper that is truly “unbossed and unbought”. In this newspaper, Diane Bukowski published the exclusive scoop that gives hope to everyone who has gone through foreclosure in Oakland County since 2009. She told property owners that the sheriff deed in their foreclosure might be invalid, if the auctioneer who conducted the sheriff sale had a conflict of interest. The New Jerusalem case highlights the potential conflict of interest of Attorney Thomas Rabette.

If the RICO allegations in New Jerusalem’s proposed amended complaint are true, then two people can make a difference, those two people being Thomas Rabette and Sheriff Mike Bouchard. If Rabette was employed with the Oakland County Sheriff’s Office when Sheriff Bouchard steered a no-bid contract to a company that Rabette represented as an attorney, and Rabette worked for that company while he was still working for the Sheriff’s Office, then Rabette had a conflict of interest. Michigan law makes it a crime for anyone, including sheriff’s, to have a conflict of interest, so if it was unlawful for Bouchard to authorize Rabette to sign sheriff deeds, then the sheriff deeds Rabette signed are invalid. But the plot thickens: What if Rabette, the company’s other officers, and their wives then all made the statutory maximum political campaign contributions to Bouchard’s bid to become Michigan’s Governor in 2010? Was the contract steering a pay-to-play scheme?

According to the Oakland County Sheriff’s Office Annual Report for 2010, (see link: http://www.oakgov.com/sheriff/assets/docs/OCSO_annualreport2010.pdf there were 8818 foreclosures in 2009 and 9727 in 2010. For the sake of argument, let’s assume that, of the more than 18,000 foreclosures in Oakland County in 2009-2010, Thomas Rabette was the auctioneer for only 10%, or 1800 sheriff sales. According to City-Data, the median value of homes and condos in Oakland County was $186,800. (See link: http://www.city-data.com/county/Oakland_County-MI.html) If Thomas Rabette unlawfully signed the sheriff deeds for 1800 Oakland County properties valued at an average of $186,800 each, then he alone has caused more than $336 million in sheriff deeds to have clouded title. Because federal RICO laws permit civil litigants to sue for triple damages, then the economic impact of Bouchard and Rabette’s alleged pay-to-play scheme potentially exposes Oakland County to more than a billion dollars in liability! If Rabette signed more than 10% of the Oakland County sheriff deeds executed since 2009, then the economic impact of his alleged corruption increases exponentially.

Given Michigan’s fragile economy, the media outlets who are bossed and bought would not want to publicize that millions, if not billions, of dollars in Oakland County titles to banks are clouded due to Bouchard’s corruption. Only Voice of Detroit wants to tell property owners that their rights are being violated!

This is the problem. A big problem! What is the solution? It’s easy to do as federal Judge Robert Cleland seems to have done, to simply turn a blind eye to Sheriff Bouchard’s corruption, and allow people who can’t afford their mortgage to be evicted by any means necessary, including by means of invalid sheriff deeds. The end doesn’t justify the means, particularly if the means require us to compromise our standards of government integrity. You’d think the banks, just as much, (if not more than foreclosed homeowners), would want to put a stop to Bouchard if he is guilty of what New Jerusalem accuses him of. Then, the banks’ sheriff deeds wouldn’t have clouded title. Honest government isn’t a privilege. It’s everyone’s right!

Ultimately, turning a blind eye to corruption costs everyone so much more than $336 million. Even people who don’t live in Oakland County suffer if that county is bankrupted and blighted by unpunished, corrupt politicians. We all pay the price of evil triumphing because good people do nothing. It would be wise of Oakland County to investigate Bouchard and Rabette.