SHARON State files suit against ex-notary public

The defendant said he was misled by the home improvement company.
SHARON, Pa. -- The Pennsylvania Attorney General has filed a lawsuit against a former Sharon notary public accused of illegally notarizing loan documents for a Pittsburgh contractor accused of bilking customers.
Attorney General Jerry Pappert said he filed the lawsuit Thursday in Commonwealth Court against Todd Verk of 185 Smith Ave.
Verk, whose commission expired in April 2000, is accused of violating Pennsylvania's Consumer Protection Law, Notary Public Law and Uniform Acknowledgment Act, Pappert said.
Sought in suit
The suit asks the court to:
UPermanently bar Verk from engaging in notary services in Pennsylvania.
UOrder him to pay full restitution or $100, whichever is greater, to each consumer who was charged for his notary services.
UOrder him to pay civil penalties of $1,000 per violation and $3,000 for each violation involving a consumer age 60 or older.
UForce him to pay the state's cost of the investigation.
What happened
Pappert said that before April 2000, Verk notarized documents for W. Timothy McKee, individually and doing business as Zintron, a Pittsburgh-based home improvement contractor; Terry Boring, also known as Jim McKee, individually and doing business as Zintron; and Pa. Allstate Builders.
All three of those parties were named as defendants in a June 21 lawsuit filed by the state accusing them of luring mostly low-income consumers with poor credit histories into home improvement and financing contracts that the defendants failed to start, complete or adequately perform, Pappert said.
Homeowners were forced to make payments on the loans, secured by their mortgages, for work they never received, he said.
Verk said Thursday that he was shocked by the filing and that he hadn't spoken with the attorney general's office about this case for two years.
He said he fully cooperated with the state investigation then and is willing to continue to do so. He thinks the case will be resolved before it goes to trial, he said.
Verk said he was misled by Zintron, whose employees brought him what they said were blanket forms they had taken to clients and the clients had signed.
Those Zintron employees signed sworn statements in front of him that the clients had indeed signed the documents and he then notarized them, Verk said.
The lawsuit against Verk accuses him of accepting payment for illegally notarizing home improvement and loan documents for 60 consumers in Venango, Crawford and Dauphin counties.
Not present
The documents from Zintron were given to Verk, and he is accused of notarizing them without any of the 60 consumers signing the paperwork in his presence, as required by law, Pappert said.
The lawsuit alleges that at least two of the consumers said their notarized signatures were forgeries, Pappert said.
Verk told investigators that he traveled to Crawford and Venango counties to notarize the documents at consumers' homes, but he never made those trips, Pappert said.