NONPRECEDENTIAL DISPOSITION To be cited only in accordance with Fed. R. App. P. 32.1 United States Court of Appeals For the Seventh Circuit Chicago, Illinois 60604 February 6, 2019 Before ILANA DIAMOND ROVNER, Circuit Judge DAVID F. HAMILTON, Circuit Judge AMY J. ST. EVE, Circuit Judge No. 18‐2429 DEUTSCHE BANK NATIONAL Appeal from the United States District TRUST COMPANY, as Trustee for Court for the Northern District GSAA Home Equity Trust 2006‐18, of Illinois, Eastern Division. Asset‐Backed Certificates, Series 2006‐ 18, No. 13‐CV‐2599 Plaintiff‐Appellee, Virginia M. Kendall, v. Judge. TRACY CORNISH, Defendant‐Appellant. O R D E R This is an appeal from a judgment foreclosing the mortgage on defendant Tracy Cornish’s home and confirming the sale of that home in a court‐ordered auction. On July 16, 2018, this court granted Cornish’s motion to stay the district court’s judgment and thus delayed the turnover of the residence to the buyer, which was plaintiff Deutsche Bank itself. That order said an explanation would follow. This is the explanation, though our thinking has evolved based on amendments to Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 62 and Federal Rule of Appellate Procedure 8 that took effect on December 1, 2018. No. 18‐2429 Page 2 At issue is how we should apply those rules to appeals of mortgage foreclosure judgments in the wake of a recent change in our circuit’s law affecting those appeals. In HSBC Bank, U.S.A., N.A. v. Townsend, 793 F.3d 771 (7th Cir. 2015), we held that in mortgage foreclosures in federal courts in Illinois, there is no final appealable judgment until the district court has not only foreclosed the mortgage but also ordered a judicial sale of the property and later confirmed the results of the sale and ordered turnover of the property. See also Bank of America, N.A. v. Martinson, 828 F.3d 532 (7th Cir. 2016) (extending Townsend to mortgage foreclosures under Wisconsin law). Townsend means that the borrower’s first opportunity to appeal the merits of the underlying debt and any affirmative defenses comes only after the district court has confirmed the sale. At that point, eviction is imminent. The practical question we address here is whether a stay should depend on a quick evaluation of the likely merits of the appeal, where the parties, lawyers, and judges must act under the time pressure of a 30‐day eviction deadline, or whether we should allow normal appellate processes to work as they would in most other cases to enforce debts where the lender’s interest is protected by security. We recognize as a practical matter that most mortgage foreclosures are likely to be affirmed. But that is also true of most commercial debt judgments, and of most civil judgments generally, for that matter. That practical reality does not mean that courts need to change the process to force at the outset a rushed evaluation of the likely merits of the appeal. There is still plenty of room for human and legal error in mortgage foreclosures, especially in this age of high‐volume securitized mortgages ...
Original document
Source: All recent Immigration Decisions In All the U.S. Courts of Appeals