From: The Week
A Pittsburgh woman is claiming that Bank of America wrongfully foreclosed on her home, and in so doing ransacked her possessions, cut her power lines, padlocked her doors, and confiscated her pet parrot. Angela Iannelli, 46—who was away when repo men allegedly made off with her beloved blue macaw, Luke—says she's still "afraid to set foot in her house" and has filed a civil suit against BoA (the bank reportedly admits the foreclosure was a "mistake"). (Watch an ABC report about Angela Iannelli's foreclosed home.) Here, four more individuals claiming wrongful repossession nightmares:
Wedding dress and all?
Last December, Nilly Mauck, 31, says she came home to find her décor brutally simplified. Mauck claims contractors assigned to repossess condo No. 1156 mistakenly carted off all the furnishing and possessions in No. 1157 — her Las Vegas apartment of two years — everything from immigration records to her wedding dress. Though she's demanded "$100,000 to $200,000" in compensation, the Realtor has offered only $5,000. Mauck says she's seeking legal advice and learning "to live with the clothes on her back."
Smells fishy
Dr. Alan Schroit claims he got a "putrid" surprise when he arrived at his Galveston, Texas, vacation home last October after Bank of America ("with which he has neither a relationship nor a mortgage") allegedly repossessed his home and turned off the utilities, leaving 75 pounds of frozen salmon and halibut to rot in the fridge. Schroit, who'd been planning to grill the fish for 30 guests the next night, is suing the bank. (For its part, BoA does "not believe the case will show merit.”)
Dirty pool?
In 2008, Kissimmee, Fla., resident Denroy Bell was living in London, England, when — he claims — a confused local bank attempted to foreclose on his home. The institution, Citi-Residential, allegedly changed the locks and drained the swimming pool. "It was like an army came up and took over the house," said Esther Goshop, Bell's neighbor. Unusually gracious, Bell has asked only that Citi-Residential refill his pool and restore his locks.
Promises, promises...
A jury punished Countrywide Home Loans in January 2009 for failing to notice that it was repossessing and selling the wrong Las Vegas condo back in 2003. Sgt. Gerald Thitchener and his wife, Katrina, absent at the time, were awarded $3.4 million in damages. "[Countrywide] never even said they were sorry," noted one juror. "[Though they did say] it would never happen again."
