UNITED STATES COURT OF APPEALS FOR THE D.C. CIRCUIT


WILLIAMS, BRAD

v.

FIRST GOVT MTGE


97-7195a

D.C. Cir. 1999


*	*	*


Tatel, Circuit Judge: A 61-year-old disabled, retired paint- er and
handyman, appellee Brad Williams has owned his  home in Northeast
Washington, D.C. , for 28 years. Williams  retired in 1987 due to
physical disability.


In 1994, Williams had a $42,000 mortgage from Central  Money Mortgage
Company. He paid $587 per month. Be- cause he owed $1,400 in unpaid
property taxes, the D.C.  government advertised his house for auction
in a tax sale.  Short on cash, Williams went to several lenders,
including  seven banks, seeking a $1,400 loan to pay his taxes.
Because  his income was too low, most would not give him credit.


Appellant First Government Mortgage and Investors Cor- poration offered
to help Williams, though not by loaning him  the $1,400 he needed to
make the payment. Instead, First  Government offered to refinance his
entire mortgage through  a 30-year loan for $58,300 with a 13.9
percent interest rate  and $686 monthly payments. Although the monthly
payment  was $100 more than he had been paying, and although the  term
of the loan was longer than he wanted, Williams reluc- tantly took the
loan, believing he had no other way to avert  foreclosure. Most of the
loan, $42,913, paid off his existing  mortgage; $7,596 covered various
fees; $1,609 covered his  taxes; $1,273 went to pay for a two-year
life insurance policy;  the remaining $4,909 eventually went toward
his monthly  payments.


At the time of the loan settlement, Williams was receiving  $1,072 a
month in disability benefits, $100 of which went to  health insurance,
plus up to $3,000 a year from part-time 


work. At most he had roughly $1,200 a month in disposable  income, over
half of which went to First Government to cover  his $686 monthly
payments. This left little more than $500  each month to buy
necessities for himself and his dependents.  With 11 children and 23
grandchildren, Williams testified, his  household had at least seven
people in it at any given time. 


Williams kept up with his loan payments for 12 months, but  his
financial circumstances steadily worsened. He began to  run out of
food by the latter part of each month. His  electricity, gas, and
water were cut off. He fell behind on his  loan payments. In August
1996, Industry Mortgage Compa- ny (to whom First Government had
assigned the loan) served  him with a foreclosure notice demanding


Williams filed suit in the United States District Court for  the
District of Columbia, seeking to enjoin the foreclosure, to  rescind
the loan, and to recover damages pursuant to statuto- ry and common
law causes of action. Among other things, he  claimed (1) that First
Government violated section 28-3904(r)  of the D.C. Consumer
Protection Procedures Act ("CPPA")  by knowingly taking advantage of
his inability to protect his  interests in the loan transaction or by
knowingly making him  a loan whose payments he could not pay with any
reasonable  probability; (2) that First Government violated the common
 law doctrine of unconscionability articulated in Williams v. 
Walker-Thomas Furniture Co., 350 F.2d 445 (D.C. Cir. 1965);  and (3)
that First Government violated the federal Truth in  Lending Act
("TILA") by failing to disclose the life insurance  premium as a
finance charge and by failing to give him timely  notice of his right
to cancel the loan. First Government  moved for summary judgment,
arguing that the CPPA does  not apply to home mortgage loans. The
district court denied  the motion. See Williams v. Central Money Co.,


After a one-day trial, the jury returned an $8,400 verdict in  favor of
Williams on his CPPA claim. Finding the evidence  sufficient to
sustain the verdict, the district court denied First  Government's
motion for judgment notwithstanding the ver- dict. See Williams v.
First Gov't Mortgage & Investors  Corp., 974 F. Supp. 17, 22 (D.D.C.
1997). After trebling the 


jury's award to $25,200, as authorized by section  28-3905(k)(1) of
the CPPA, the district court denied  Williams's common law
unconscionability and TILA claims.  See id. at 18-22. Williams then
filed a motion seeking  $199,340 in attorneys' fees. The district
court awarded him  the entire amount. See Williams v. Central Money
Co., No.  96-1993 (D.D.C. Jan. 28, 1998); Williams v. Central Money 
Co., No. 96-1993 (D.D.C. Oct. 1, 1997). Both sides appealed.


First Government's primary claim is that section 28-3904(r)  of the
CPPA does not apply to the transaction in this case. It  first argues
that the district court should have applied Mary- land law instead of
the D.C. consumer protection statute  because First Government is not
a D.C. corporation, its  offices are located in Maryland, the meetings
with Williams  took place in Maryland, and the loan payments went to a
 Maryland address. We review choice-of-law issues de novo.  See Felch
v. Air Florida, 866 F.2d 1521, 1523 (D.C. Cir. 1989).


Because Williams's CPPA claim against First Government  is a diversity
action, the law of the forum state supplies the  applicable
choice-of-law standard. See Klaxon Co. v. Stentor  Elec. Mfg. Co., 313
U.S. 487, 496 (1941). Under D.C. law,  courts must "evaluate the
governmental policies underlying  the applicable laws and determine
which jurisdiction's policy  would be more advanced by the application
of its law to the  facts of the case under review." District of
Columbia v.  Coleman, 667 A.2d 811, 816 (D.C. 1995). "Where each state
 would have an interest in application of its own law to the  facts
... the law of the jurisdiction with the stronger interest  will
apply." Bledsoe v. Crowley, 849 F.2d 639, 641 (D.C. Cir.  1988). "If
the interests of the two jurisdictions in the applica- tion of their
law are equally weighty, the law of the forum will  be applied." Id.
at 641 n.1 (citing Kaiser-Georgetown Com- munity Health Plan v.
Stutsman, 491 A.2d 502, 509 & n.10  (D.C. 1985)).


Maryland no doubt has an interest in ensuring that lenders  behave
fairly, and the loan transaction in this case did have  contacts with
Maryland. But the District of Columbia like- wise has an interest in
protecting its citizens from predatory 


loan practices, and the transaction also had significant con- tacts
with the District. Without deciding which jurisdiction's  policy
interests are stronger, we have no hesitation conclud- ing that on the
facts of this case the District's interests are at  least as strong as
Maryland's--a conclusion that compels the  application of D.C. law.
See id. As the district court ex- plained, "by issuing a loan to a
D.C. resident and taking his  D.C. home as collateral," First
Government "availed [itself]  of, and subjected [itself] to, the
consumer protection laws of  the District of Columbia." Williams I,
974 F. Supp. at 27.  "If the CPPA did not apply to cases like this
one," said the  district court, "loan and mortgage companies could ...
evade  D.C. consumer protection laws by locating themselves just 
across the District line from the D.C. citizens they seek as 


Next, First Government offers the novel but meritless  argument that
its compliance with the federal Truth in Lend- ing Act shields it from
CPPA liability. The two statutes have  quite different purposes and
impose quite different require- ments. TILA mandates the disclosure of
certain documents  in lending transactions. See 15 U.S.C. ss 1631-1649
(1994).  The CPPA provides substantive protections for borrowers 
against unconscionable loan terms and provisions. See D.C.  Code Ann.
s 28-3904(r) (1996). Nothing in TILA or its  legislative history
suggests that Congress intended the Act's  disclosure regime to
provide the maximum protection to  which borrowers are entitled
nationwide; states remain free  to impose greater protections for
borrowers. First Govern- ment has identified no way in which the CPPA
would defeat  TILA's purposes, nor has it suggested how joint
applicability  of the two statutes would subject it to conflicting
obligations.  We thus hold that TILA does not preempt the CPPA and 
that TILA compliance does not immunize lenders like First  Government
against CPPA liability. See Cippollone v. Lig- gett Group, Inc., 505
U.S. 504, 516 (1992) (discussing criteria  for finding preemption);
California Fed. Sav. & Loan Ass'n  v. Guerra, 479 U.S. 272, 280-81


Finally, as in DeBerry v. First Gov't Mortgage & Investors  Corp., No.
97-7211 (D.C. Cir. Mar. 26, 1999), also released 


today, First Government argues that section 28-3904(r) of the  CPPA,
which governs "terms or conditions of sales or leases,"  does not
apply to home mortgage or refinancing transactions  like the one at
issue here. D.C. Code Ann. s 28-3904(r). In  DeBerry, we noted that
the contrary argument--that section  28-3904(r) does apply to real
estate mortgage transactions-- "does not lack persuasive force" in
light of the text, structure,  and legislative history of the CPPA.
DeBerry, No. 97-7211,  at 11. Nevertheless, "because the local courts
have not ruled  directly on this issue and because the answer will
have  significant effects on District of Columbia mortgage finance 
practice," we certified the issue to the D.C. Court of Appeals.  Id.
We therefore decline to decide whether section 28- 3904(r) of the CPPA
applies to home mortgage transactions  and instead await the D.C.
Court of Appeals's response to the  certification of this issue in
DeBerry. In the meantime, we  shall append to the certification in
DeBerry the briefs and  record in this case.


Pending resolution of this issue by the D.C. Court of  Appeals, we hold
in abeyance First Government's further  claims that the record
evidence was insufficient to support the  jury's determination of
liability and award of damages under  the CPPA, and that the $199,340
attorneys' fee award was  either disproportionate to the amount of
damages recovered  or unreasonable in relation to Williams's success
in the litiga- tion. Given the possible implications of the D.C. Court
of  Appeals's judgment on the certified issue, as well as our  desire
to avoid deciding this case piecemeal, we also hold in  abeyance
Williams's appeal from the district court's denial of  his common law
unconscionability and TILA claims.


So ordered.