A California lawyer listed at a Garden Grove address already had a “Consumer Alert” warning placed on his State Bar of California entry as the agency probes at least 15 instances of alleged unprofessional conduct related to mortgage loan modifications.
Yesterday, Stephen Lyster Siringoringo learned the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (CFPB), an independent federal agency based in Washington, D.C., filed a lawsuit to win a permanent injunction against him and related businesses: Siringoringo Law Firm as well as Clausen & Cobb Management Company, Inc.
CFPB officials claim Siringoringo–a Whittier College School of Law graduate admitted to practice in 2009–used heavy marketing in English and Spanish to lure customers into paying initial, pre-contract fees between $1,995 and $3,500 and then $495 a month to negotiate with lenders, but wouldn't deliver on promised services.
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Such conduct, according to the agency, violates federal Regulation O governing “mortgage assistance relief services” which requires pre-payment contracts and no deceptive practices.
In addition to obtaining a permanent injunction against the defendants, the CFPB wants them to pay unknown restitution of “ill-gotten revenues” and civil penalties.
Alfred Clausen and Joshua Cobb are also named as defendants.
U.S. District Court Judge James V. Selna will preside in the case inside the Ronald Reagan Federal Courthouse in Santa Ana.
The defendants–who operated in Los Angeles, Orange, San Bernardino and Riverside counties–have not yet filed a response in court.
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CNN-featured investigative reporter R. Scott Moxley has won Journalist of the Year honors at the Los Angeles Press Club; been named Distinguished Journalist of the Year by the LA Society of Professional Journalists; obtained one of the last exclusive prison interviews with Charles Manson disciple Susan Atkins; won inclusion in Jeffrey Toobin’s The Best American Crime Reporting for his coverage of a white supremacist’s senseless murder of a beloved Vietnamese refugee; launched multi-year probes that resulted in the FBI arrests and convictions of the top three ranking members of the Orange County Sheriff’s Department; and gained praise from New York Times Magazine writers for his “herculean job” exposing entrenched Southern California law enforcement corruption.