By all appearances, Aaron Wider is the chief executive of a flourishing mortgage bank in Garden City, issuing more than $33 million in home loans to buyers across Nassau and Suffolk counties over the past four years.

A closer look at his lending practices, however, reveals that many of these loans relied on faulty appraisals and exaggerated loan applications, leaving behind angry homeowners who are struggling to pay mortgages on overpriced homes.

Aaron Wilder, CEO of HTFC and a mortgage investor, gave a deposition to Robert Bodzin, a lawyer from GMAC Bank. In February, U.S. District Judge Eduardo Robreno declared the deposition a “spectacular failure”, ordered Wider to give a new deposition, and fined Wider and his lawyer $29K.

GMAC Bank has filed a lawsuit against HTFC alleging that the company sold loans that were not property underwritten.

ROBERT BODZIN: My question is: Where are you currently employed?
AARON WIDER: I’m not. I work for free
BODZIN: Okay. You’re not employed by HTFC Corporation?
WIDER: No, I own HTFC Corporation.
BODZIN: Okay. And what do the initials HTFC mean?
WIDER: Hit That Fuckin’ Clown.

From The Wall Street Journal “Curses! Client Swears His Way Through Deposition, Pays Price”

Throughout the deposition, Robreno said, Wider “sought to intimidate opposing counsel by maintaining a persistently hostile demeanor, employing uncivil insults, and using profuse vulgarity.”

In one passage, GMAC’s lawyer, Robert B. Bodzin of Kleinbard Bell & Brecker in Philadelphia, asked Wider to open a file so that Bodzin could ask questions about certain documents.

According to the transcript, as quoted in Robreno’s opinion, Wider erupted, saying: “‘I’m taking a break. Fuck him. You open up the document. You want me to look at something, you get the document out. Earn your fucking money, asshole. Isn’t the law wonderful?’”

In another passage, Bodzin said: “We’re going to adjourn this deposition if this happens again because you are offending every single person.”

According to Robreno’s opinion, Wider responded: “‘Don’t speak for anybody in here except yourself fuck face.’”

When Bodzin said he was speaking for himself and the court reporter, Wider said: “‘If she had a problem with me she would say something. She knows it’s [not] directed toward her. It’s directed to you because you’re a piece of shit and a piece of garbage and I’m the only person in your life that is fucking up your world and I enjoy it.’”

Robreno said the transcript showed that Wider “used the word ‘fuck’ and variants thereof no less than 73 times.”

Curses! from the WSJ blog

Lawyer and Client Sanctioned Over Client’s Conduct, Use of ‘F Word’ During Deposition from Law.com