The U.S. Justice Foundation advertises itself as being able to help people help themselves, but the I-Team has learned that state authorities are hearing from some people who consider themselves victims and not clients.
Since it was first reported, the U.S. Justice Foundation closed its doors Monday. The state Attorney General's Office says its phone hasn't stopped ringing. Callers claim the foundation and its president pledged to keep them in their homes.
Karen Jayne expects to be kicked out of hers any day now. In a small office in Henderson, the bookkeeper takes comfort in the one space she can legally occupy, "You can either laugh about it or cry about it, and I've already cried and cried and cried about it."
The other space, her home, now belongs to a bank. Jayne predicts her last-ditch legal effort to stay will fail as miserably as her first appearance as her own attorney, "It was a little intimidating because I'm there all by myself and I'm not a lawyer. I don't know what's going on and there's three lawyers from three different banks there trying to get me thrown out."
Jayne is one of at least 50 people identified by the courts who filed a lawsuit against their mortgage company at the direction of the U.S. Justice Foundation. Using what appear to be boiler-plate legal documents, the company prepares the paperwork for people to represent themselves.
Jayne says foundation president Jack Ferm told her a lawsuit alleging unfair lending practices could keep her in her home for 10 months to a year. Instead, what will likely be her last court hearing is scheduled for next week, some three months after she filed.
"I don't know what to think of them at this point. I know I got lost in the shuffle. I don't know whether it was intentional or if they didn't have enough expertise to do what they said they could do. I don't know," she said.
Jayne isn't the only one who has questions about what happened to her case. Judge Kenneth Cory has ordered Ferm to appear to show cause as to why he shouldn't be held in contempt for practicing law without a license. Ferm faces a similar order in federal court, and an investigation by the state Attorney General's Office and the Nevada bar.
It's little comfort to Jayne, who built her bookkeeping business from the ground up only to watch it sag with the economy, "I was doing well and now I'm not and I didn't do it to the economy. But I'll tell you something, I am paying for this and I will pay for it for the rest of my life. I paid with my home, paid with my business, with my health. I've paid with everything I have."
Jayne refinanced her modest home in 2006 to grow her business and by the end of 2007 business was off by nearly 80-percent. But she says she's an excellent bookkeeper and still hoping business will pick up.
