Not the typical abusive behavior that often is noted in this thread, but I find this arrogance way too typical. And they wonder why the public has so little respect for the law. Apparently the Sheriff in Cook County also has little respect for his legal duties, and he can pick and choose which to honor. Must be nice.
---

CHICAGO, Illinois (CNN) -- Sheriff Thomas J. Dart said Wednesday he is suspending foreclosure evictions in Cook County, which had been on track to reach a record number of evictions, many because of mortgage foreclosures.

Sheriff Thomas J. Dart of Cook County, Illinois, says proper eviction procedures aren't always been followed.

He said many of the evictions involve renters who are paying their rent on time but are being thrown out because the landlord has fallen behind on mortgage payments.

Mortgage companies are supposed to identify a building's occupants before asking for an eviction, but sheriff's deputies routinely find that the mortgage companies have not done so, he said.

"These mortgage companies only see pieces of paper, not people, and don't care who's in the building," Dart said. "They simply want their money and don't care who gets hurt along the way.

"On top of it all, they want taxpayers to fund their investigative work for them. We're not going to do their jobs for them anymore. We're just not going to evict innocent tenants. It stops today."
---

Didn't you mean to put this in the forum for good cops?

Read between the lines, how many of those people getting foreclosed on do you think got mortgages thru some off the work Oblahma did when he was "a community organizer" I bet enough that if they started getting tossed back on the street, that would tend to look bad in the press, and I am also willing to bet that on the first weds in Nov they will be right back tossing people out of their homes.

That is a fair, if not jaded, thought. I am going to evaluate my day to day activities and decide which legal obligations I am going to ignore now until after the election.

These people don't HAVE mortgages. They are tenants, who pay rent for their homes to owners who have mortgages. Like in apartment house.
Tenants are supposed to have certain rights as to advance notice of what's happening, by law.

But the tenants are not a "named party" to the foreclosures. The basic foreclosures all done through routine affidavits from the mortgage holder and filings with the County Recorder.

The tenants are supposed to be notified of the foreclosure by both the mortgage holder and the owner. But the owner can just do nothing. The preprinted Affidavit from the mortgage holder (big company) simply says that notice has been made to tenants generally. No one checks this to determine whether it happened, or is accountable for failure to do this notice. The company does not even have a list of the names of the tenants.

Of course, the owner won't notify the tenants, they'd stop paying him the monthly rent, which he collects as long as he can.

The mortgage holder doesn't even know the names of the tenants, and the people who would send notices don't visit the building to find out. (They wouldn't dare, this is Cook County.)

So the tenant does not know what's coming until the Sheriff comes. By law, the Sheriff does the "dirty work", and everyone else stays at their desk.


Darn Sheriff, he won't "follow the law" and put paid up tenants out on the street with no notice.

Obama?
He used to represent tenants like this. But then he got a real job representing the landlords who get mortgages to buy the buildings. Then to the Senate....The rest is history and destiny.

For space considerations, I did not post the entire article. The Sheriff says that he is going to refuse to do his legal duty for ANY foreclosure, using the landlord/tenant situation as his rationale.

If the suggestion is that all landlords are scum and all tenants rightous (which is a huge stretch from your post...) ...I would reject that and simply state that a law enforcement official does not have the discretion to pick and choose what laws to support in this instance. No more than Biden suggesting in the debate that not only should the feds rewrite the interest rate on mortgages, but also the principal. I guess I am too jaded. No one is out there suggesting that all people that are working one, two three jobs to stay current in all their obligations should get the same treatment.

In the words of Howard Beale, "I am as mad as hell and not going to take it anymore."

I don't defend the Sheriff, he does not have the answer. But we have some situations that are pretty absurd. Some of this stuff defies common sense, and it's probably worse if the Sheriff decides to simply decide for himself which orders he chooses to ignore, and which to enforce.

Actually, many of the tenants DO know what's going on, they are not stupid. Probably, many have not paid rent for a long time, and may have information about how to take advantage of the situation, perhaps from 'community activists", even.

If a space traveler stopped at earth, and watched people being removed from their homes, by the government, then different people being moved right back in by a new owner, (with a new government guaranteed mortgatge) all to satisfy the legal paperwork requirements of the government, he'd probably have a few suggestions for us.

Hang on a second. Isn't that part of the risk of renting? The tenant I understand has a leasehold estate on the property while their lease is enforceable.

If the owner screws up and doesn't pay his mortgage, lets not bullshit ourselves and say the tenants deserve government welfare and be allowed to stay in a building the owner isn't paying for. Sad times for the tenants, and they would have the moral/legal obligation of going after the owner in court for the loss of their residence. Sort of a subrogation.

Can we please get away from the government and its agencies bailing everyone out in every situation with the public's money? We have a process in place for these things already, as frustrating as it might be. Take the owner to court if you are the tenant, sue for damages.

Fact is the situation stinks, the owner is an a-hole for not being able to pay his debts (whether he pissed the rent money away, was on an adjustable rate which skyrocketed, ran off to Mexico, whatever), and the tenants should have the right to be made whole. But that does not include the gov't or sheriff deciding they can stick around in a building that is truthfully being stolen from the mortgage company.

People need to toughen up in my opinion. Buy a house if you are worried about this stuff, if not then face the consequences. The current market hasn't forced me to foreclose, why do we use that as an excuse to do stupid things? This sheriff is flat wrong and should be removed.

No, I don't think they deserve that. But I do think they deserve to be notified by both the building owner, and the mortgage lender. Seems pretty common sense to me. Now, if the sheriff shows up and they say they havent been notified by anyone, he should take it on himself to notify them, record it, and come back in 30 days to throw them out.

I was under the impression from past articles that just such a framework process exists... They go to court, show they paid rent, they get 30 days to move. Still sucks, but it's not "out on the street for you and your kids"

I have no problem with notification, they should be notified no question.

The rest of my rant hinges on whether they were or were not notified I suppose. But that is a fun one to prove. Prove to me you notified me.

Every landlord I had, about 7 to be exact, never paid for certified mail with delivery confirmation. We got flyers slipped under our door. Lots of ways to prove/disprove if a tenant got one of those.

our announcements go out when we collect rent. They sign a ledger saying they got the news.

In some states, the lease over comes the mortgage, and the lessee as long as they can prove they have paid the rent, are not allowed to be booted until the lease is up, but I do not think Illinois is such a state.

I still go back and say its politically motivated. Obama was a urban renewal guy, and that is how he spent his time before being elected to the state house, was putting together risky packages of leases and mortgages of 'renewed' housing stocks. If it starts getting out how many of the deals his fingerprints are on are going sour, it will show badly on him. Of course, everything he does shows badly on him, and that's the whole incredible deal, here's a guy who never wrote a bill, never stood for a cause, never took the lead on anything, just was mr Greyman in politics, now considered a likely US president. Good Lord above, are people really this stupid or naive?

To argue the other side, the story did in fact say

If the sheriff has proof of that, then I agree, no eviction, IF that is in fact what the law says in Illinois.

Lots of "if's" there to make what he is doing ok. Last I checked sheriff's aren't supposed to interpret the law and decide when to enforce it, as phorvick suggested already. The way I read the story, he has been told to evict, meaning it is no longer the sheriff's decision. Do the job you are paid for.

I will only add this, the sheriff is a politician, and there is no such thing as a clean politician in Chicago. NONE. The dirt is far too embedded and institutionalized.

I disagree with his ideas of what is his job, and what latitude in enforcement he has.

What a wonderful way to finance the Sheriff's re-election campaign.