Wednesday, June 21, 2006

Formal Mayoral-race candidate faced several lawsuits- He also owned LV FINANCIAL!

Edward M. Lopes - Qualified
1504 E Harding St.Orlando, Fl 32806
Deputy Treasurer -- Edward M. Lopes
Qualifying StatementCampaign Treasurer Appointment
Affidavit of Undue Burden
Loyalty Oath
Statement of Financial Interests
Financial Report, period ending March 27, 2005
Financial Report, period ending April 10, 2005
Financial Report, period ending April 10, 2005 - Amendment

Orlando mayoral candidate Edward M. Lopes faces several lawsuits over his business dealings by companies that say he cheated them, records show.The candidate also has accumulated court judgments totaling more than $100,000 that were entered after he failed to respond to two other lawsuits, according to court records.

Five lawsuits have been filed in Orlando against Lopes or his debt-collection agency, LV Financial, in the past nine months, including one from a bank that says it is owed more than $450,000.Lopes, who filed an affidavit saying it would be a financial hardship to pay the full qualifying fee to run for office in the May 3 election, did not return repeated phone calls to his home and office.Lopes' attorney said his client never tried to defraud anyone and the legal troubles stem from a business deal that went sour."Ed took it on the chin," attorney Richard Douglas Sierra said. "It put LV out of business, but Ed is going to do his best to get them their money back.

"But others, including companies from California to New Jersey that have dealt with Lopes, say he has cheated them and ignored their recent attempts to contact him."We've heard an array of different stories. It's a joke," said Dana Koprowski, vice president of Shekinah Inc. in Huntington Beach, Calif.Lopes is one of five candidates on the ballot for the special election to replace suspended Mayor Buddy Dyer.

Lopes and LV Financial borrowed $452,029 from New York-based Sterling National Bank in June, according to Sierra and court records. A contract required the money to be used to buy hundreds of bad credit-card accounts. LV Financial would try to collect the overdue accounts and share the proceeds with the bank.In a lawsuit filed in U.S. District Court in Orlando on Feb. 14, the bank accuses Lopes of not paying it "a single penny" after nearly eight months.

"It is extremely unusual and highly suspect for a credit card account portfolio of this magnitude to yield no proceeds over a nearly eight-month period. . . . The circumstances strongly suggest that LV may be diverting account payments," the lawsuit says.Sierra acknowledged that Lopes owes the money to Sterling. The credit-card debt he purchased turned out to be old and difficult to collect, he said."It didn't pan out.

It is Ed's intention to pay them off," Sierra said.But Lopes' trouble doesn't end with Sterling National Bank.A handful of other collection agencies say Lopes sold them some of the old credit-card accounts that are included in the Sterling lawsuit. Many of the same accounts were sold to more than one collection agency, making them worthless, according to the agencies and another lawsuit filed against Lopes' company."When we sent out letters to people on the list, we started to get calls from some of these people, saying they'd been getting letters from other collection agencies," said Stanley Michelman, an owner of All-States Funding Group in New Jersey.

Michelman sued LV Financial in Orange Circuit Court for breach of contract three weeks ago after paying the company $40,000 for about 1,200 credit accounts in December.Jacksonville attorney Amanda Rolfe Tise said her firm paid Lopes' company $60,000 for 798 accounts about the same time."Lopes won't return our calls.

All of our letters were returned; one even said he was deceased," Tise said.Representatives of Shekinah Inc., the California-based collection agency, said they paid LV Financial $54,000 in January. Before company officials discovered that the accounts were worthless, they paid another $48,000 for more accounts, which they say they never received.Lopes has had other legal troubles as well, according to two of the lawsuits filed in Orange County:

A leasing company sued LV Financial in October, saying the company hadn't made payments on its rented office equipment for seven months. Court records show Lopes never responded to the lawsuit, and a judge recently granted the leasing company's request to repossess 16 computers, a phone system and other equipment, and try to collect $54,000 it is owed.

A medical practice hired LV Financial two years ago to collect from patients who had failed to pay, according to a lawsuit. The practice's attorneys said Lopes' company collected from many of those patients, but he didn't send the money to the doctors who'd hired him. Lopes didn't respond to that suit, either, and the court entered a judgment against LV Financial for about $50,000.Sierra said LV Financial is out of business.

A financial statement Lopes filed with the city clerk last month when he declared his candidacy for mayor indicates he now runs another business, Executive Credit Group, at the same address as LV Financial.

State corporate records, however, show that company was involuntarily dissolved by the Florida Department of State last fall after the $150 check written to renew its annual registration bounced.

Mark Schlueb can be reachedat mschlueb@orlandosentinel.comor 407-420-5417.

No comments: