WASHINGTON (Sputnik) — The US Department of Justice lawsuit alleging Quicken Loans originated and underwrote mortgages in violation of US federal laws represents a continuation of the three-year US government assault on the organization, Quicken Loans Communications Vice President Aaron Emerson said in a statement.
“The Justice Department filing is simply the continuation of the abusive actions and a make-good on the Justice Department’s threats since their witch-hunt began three years ago,” Emerson said on Friday.
On Thursday, the Justice Department sued Quicken Loans for originating and underwriting mortgages backed by the Federal Housing Administration (FHA) in violation of the False Claims Act, which protects the US housing market and the FHA fund.
Emerson further explained that the filed complaint has false conclusions made from fragments of e-mails put together from 85,000 documents that the Justice Department subpoenaed.
“The Justice Department appears to be basing their entire case on a handful of out-of-context e-mail conversations skimmed from the communication between Quicken Loans employees,” Emerson said. “These conversations relate to a miniscule number of loans out of the nearly 250,000 FHA mortgages the company has closed over the past seven years.”
Emerson noted that the real victims are the many middle class US citizens who rely on FHA financing to reach their goal of home ownership.
While Quicken Loans will continue to offer FHA mortgages to its clients, he added, it will also continue to evaluate their participation in the FHA program.
Quicken Loans is a Detroit, Michigan-headquartered online retail mortgage lender that is second largest in the United States. In 2012, Quicken Loans closed more than $70 billion in home loan value, a 133 percent jump over their record of $30 billion set in 2011, according to media reports.
