Special treatment ran deep for OneUnited

A report by R. Jeffrey Smith of The Washington Post reveals that OneUnited Bank "received special treatment that went beyond what the Treasury Department or the bank and its political supporters have previously disclosed." Despite multiple internal warnings, Congress and regulators "broke with customary practices" to award the bank federal bailout funds. The story includes a timeline showing OneUnited's path to securing federal bailout money. It is one of only a few banks that have failed to make six consecutive TARP dividend payments to the federal government.

A report by ProPublica's Jake Bernstein and Jesse Eisinger "shows for the first time the extent to which banks &#8212 primarily Merrill Lynch, but also Citigroup, UBS and others &#8212 bought their own products and cranked up an assembly line that otherwise should have flagged."  These banks dealt in collateralized debt obligations, or CDOs.  A CDO is a collections of mortgage bonds, and each includes risky investments.  The banks would then create new CDOs to sell the risky pieces creating false demand for these toxic assets.

Mortgage fraud is a crime that cost an estimated $14 billion in 2009, prompting the FBI to assemble its largest ever team to fight it. But the tsunami of foreclosures is making classic scams easier and spawning new ones to boot. Reuters correspondent Nick Carey reports from Chicago.

According to an investigation by Ryan Holeywell of BailoutSleuth.com, "At least one of every nine banks that got taxpayer investment through the government's Troubled Asset Relief Program was later cited by federal regulators for violating rules or failing to meet operating or financial standards."  This is in contradiction to Treasury Department statements claiming TARP funds were only invested in healthy banks.

An analysis of state data by Chris Serres and Glenn Howatt, of the Minneapolis Star Tribune, shows that "people are routinely being thrown in jail for failing to pay debts. In Minnesota, which has some of the most creditor-friendly laws in the country, the use of arrest warrants against debtors has jumped 60 percent over the past four years."

An investigation by the Huffington Post Investigative Fund found "some of the nation’s largest and most elite universities stand to gain millions of dollars from selling the names and addresses of students and alumni to credit card companies while granting the companies special access to school events."  The schools earn bonuses when the credit cards are used by students.  The report includes links to the contracts obtained during the investigation.

A report by the Huffington Post Investigative fund examines "tax sale" foreclosures.  Amid the economic downturn, they are happening in Baltimore and other cities, where big banks, brokerage houses, and other investors are gaining the right from governments to collect on paltry debts of citizens. Fees and other costs swell, and homeowners who can't make the payments find themselves evicted. The result is hefty profits for the investors, with dire consequences for some communities. In the story, they follow a woman who lost her home - paid off in 1984 - due to an unpaid $362 city water bill.

An investigation by Mc Nelly Torres, of ConsumerAffairs.com, found consumers complaining of illegal, abusive conduct as collectors defy federal and state enforcers. “There’s no doubt that the debt collection industry is thriving. You can’t get blood from a rock, but these guys are trying,” said Ira Rheingold, executive director and general counsel of the National Association of Consumer Advocates, a consumer advocacy group based in Washington D.C. Consumer advocates say stronger federal laws -- and much more aggressive enforcement -- are needed. While debt collector abuses are nothing new, Torres reports that consumer advocates fear the abuses will grow more widespread in numbers and scope at a time when millions of Americans are struggling to pay their bills.

An investigation by Jesse Eisinger and Jake Bernstein of ProPublica reveals how "the hedge fund Magnetar helped create mortgage-based securities, pushed for risky things to go inside them and then bet against the investments, resulting in billions in losses for investors and ultimately making the financial crisis worse." The story can also be heard on "Inside Job," the April 9 episode of This American Life .

An investigation by Shannon Mullen of the Asbury (N.J.) Park Press shows that special-education stimulus funds have been diverted to other costs in Monmouth and Ocean counties, including legal fees and teacher benefits. "The redirection of funds was possible thanks to a previously little-used provision in the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act, the federal statute that guarantees children with disabilities the right to a 'free and appropriate' education. The law allows districts to use up to half of any annual increase in such federal aid to replace local tax dollars earmarked for special education, freeing up those funds for other uses."