Richards v. Wells Fargo Bank NA

The trial court erred in finding that the defendant's motion for leave to file counterclaims was moot since the counterclaims were independent from the grant of summary judgment to the plaintiff and the defendant filed the motion before the trial court granted summary judgment to the plaintiff.

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Sammy Richards, acting pro se, appeals the trial court’s January 29, 2013 order granting summary judgment in favor of Wells Fargo Bank, N. A., Successor By Merger to Wells Fargo Home Mortgage, Inc., and finding his motion for leave to file counterclaims moot. For the following reasons, we affirm the grant of summary judgment in favor of Wells Fargo. However, we vacate the trial court’s ruling denying Richards’s motion for leave to file counterclaims and remand the case for the trial court to exercise its discretion and issue a ruling on the merits of the motion.

On December 19, 2003, Richards gave Wells Fargo a deed to secure a debt on property Richards had purchased. The security deed pertinently provided that Richards did “grant and convey to Wells Fargo . . . , with power of sale,” the property at issue. On March 24, 2011, Richards filed in county real property records a document entitled “AFFIDAVIT REVOCATION OF POWER OF ATTORNEY Revoking All Rights for Deed Under Power Pursuant to OCGA § 10-6-141,” purporting to “revoke any and all rights given at closing to Wells Fargo,” on the basis that Wells Fargo had induced him to sign the security deed “under misrepresentation of the facts.” Then, on June 27, 2011, Richards filed a document entitled “Affidavit of Forgery Pursuant to OCGA 44-2-23,” wherein he stated that the security deed was a forgery because the “document was altered to include the Notary’s witness at sometime unbeknownst to the Mortgagor/Borrower and prior to filing into Clayton County Records on 1/7/2004.”

Richards v. Wells Fargo Bank NA

The trial court erred in finding that the defendant's motion for leave to file counterclaims was moot since the counterclaims were independent from the grant of summary judgment to the plaintiff and the defendant filed the motion before the trial court granted summary judgment to the plaintiff.

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