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Court motion says cameras in Pasco clerk's office captured lawyer doctoring mortgage documents (w/video)

 
A court motion accuses lawyer Chuck Kalogianis of altering bank foreclosure documents to benefit his clients.
A court motion accuses lawyer Chuck Kalogianis of altering bank foreclosure documents to benefit his clients.
Published May 26, 2016

Charles "Chuck'' Kalogianis, a well-known Pasco County attorney, is facing allegations that he stamped and altered court files to benefit his clients facing foreclosure.

Now a videotape has surfaced that shows him doing just that, attorneys for a loan servicing company say.

Along with a motion filed Tuesday in Pasco Circuit Court, Bayview Loan Servicing submitted a video taken by a camera in a Pasco clerk of court office between 3:20 p.m. and 3:30 p.m. on March 13, 2015.

The video shows a man in a long-sleeve shirt and dark slacks removing an object that looks like an ink stamp from an expandable folder and stamping a page in a court file. The man then returns the object to the folder.

Bayview attorneys say the man is Kalogianis and that the file is the same one containing a promissory note that originally had a "blank endorsement'' — meaning anyone could endorse it ---- but that later was stamped with the words "Bank of New York, trustee.'' Kalogianis allegedly used the stamped words as evidence that only Bank of New York had the right to foreclose on his clients, not the companies that initiated the foreclosure actions.

In its motion, Bayview asks the judge to enter a default judgment in its favor and order Kalogianis to pay its attorney fees. "The alteration of the original promissory note in the . . . case is nothing if not the sort of egregious misconduct that epitomizes fraud on the court,'' the motion says.

Bayview also wants the clerk's office to produce a list of all foreclosure cases in which Kalogianis is or has been the attorney of record, "specifically identifying'' those containing an original promissory note like the ones he allegedly altered.

Kalogianis, who unsuccessfully ran for the U.S. House in 2002, did not return calls for comment Wednesday. Last week, he said that Baview, acting on behalf of the lender, lacked the original document needed to foreclose and was trying to "turn the tables'' on him rather than lose the case.

"It is the plaintiff's own improper conduct … that should be reviewed,'' he said then.

Previous coverage: Motion accuses Pasco lawyer of altering documents in foreclosure cases

In a much longer motion filed last week, Bayview accused Kalogianis of altering records in at least five mortgage foreclosure cases in which he represented the borrowers.

Altering or forging public records, including court records, is a third-degree felony punishable by up to five years in prison. It is also a violation of rules of the Florida Bar, which publicly reprimanded Kalogianis in 2011 for not communicating with clients and for failing to supervise a non-lawyer assistant. The Bar also has a pending complaint against Kalogianis stemming from a 2007 business transaction he had with a client.

The allegations against Kalogianis raise questions about the security of court records, especially those in mortgage foreclosure cases in which hundreds of thousands of dollars may be at stake.

Pasco's clerk of court, Paula O'Neil, said Wednesday that video cameras have been installed since 2010 in all clerk's areas with public access or where money changes hand. In addition, file-viewing areas have windows so clerks can watch anyone who checks out a file including lawyers, who are officers of the court and are presumed to be trustworthy.

For roughly the past two and a half years, all documents in Pasco mortgage foreclosure and other civil cases have been filed electronically, making it almost impossible to alter them. Some older files, however, still contain paper records such as those Kalogianis is accused of doctoring.

O'Neil said she is reviewing the video purportedly showing Kalogianis stamping a file. As of Wednesday afternoon, she said she had received no indications that law enforcement is investigating what she said "absolutely" had the potential to be a crime.

In Pinellas County, all filings in mortgage foreclosure cases since May 2015 are electronic. Older, still active cases might contain paper documents but those would be scanned when someone asked to see them so they could only be viewed electronically, said Rod Tabler, senior manager of civil court records.

St. Petersburg lawyer Matt Weidner, who has represented hundreds of delinquent borrowers, said the allegations against Kalogianis are "certainly quite troubling.'' But, he noted, the promissory notes with blank fields that Kaloginias is accused of altering could also be altered by attorneys representing banks.

"What this illustrates is the reckless nature of all these documents and how even a thief could endorse them,'' he said

Contact Susan Taylor Martin at smartin@tampabay.com or (727) 893-8642.