The Next Commercial Mortgage-Backed Securities Reckoning: Enforcement, Whistleblowers, and Putback Litigation in 2026

Isaac M. Gradman, Partner | Perry, Johnson, Anderson, Miller & Moskowitz LLP

Isaac M. Gradman is a Partner at Perry, Johnson, Anderson, Miller & Moskowitz LLP, where his practice focuses on complex financial litigation and commercial disputes across civil litigation, structured finance and distressed investments, trusts and estates litigation, real estate, securities, and business law. Isaac is one of the nation’s leading legal experts in structured finance and distressed investment disputes, with particular expertise in residential mortgage-backed securities (RMBS) litigation, and has negotiated settlements leading to recoveries of over $1 billion dollars in the aggregate.

• Education & Credentials

Isaac earned his J.D., cum laude, from New York University School of Law in 2005, where he was a Dean’s Scholar and a Robert McKay Scholar, and received his B.A. in Political and Social Thought with Highest Distinction from the University of Virginia in 2002, where he was a Jefferson Scholar, an Echols Scholar, and a member of the Raven Honor Society. He is admitted to practice law in California.

• Recognition & Leadership

Isaac has been quoted and cited in leading publications around the country as a thought leader on mortgage crisis legal issues and structured finance disputes. He has represented some of the country’s largest and most active hedge funds, investment managers, monoline insurance companies, and mortgage insurers in high-stakes litigation and transactions involving RMBS, CDOs, and whole loan purchases.

• Professional Involvement

Isaac is the founder and author of “The Subprime Shakeout” (2008–present), the first law blog devoted to mortgage crisis legal issues from an investor and insurer perspective, and served as Editor of Way Too Big to Fail: How Government and Private Industry Can Build a Fail-Safe Mortgage System (Greenwich Financial Press, 2011). He authored “Who’s Watching the Watchmen? RMBS Trustees Come Under Fire as Investors Launch Next Wave of Lawsuits” in the Bank and Corporate Governance Law Reporter (October 2014) and “Cracks in the Foundation” in The American Lawyer (Spring 2013), and has spoken at the AMI RMBS Mortgage Investor Briefing Series, the State Bar of California Business Law Section, and the Midwinter Housing Finance Conference.

• Experience

Isaac began his career with a two-year federal clerkship for the Honorable Joan Lenard in the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of Florida, then practiced as a commercial litigator at Arnold & Porter (formerly Howard Rice) in San Francisco, where he was involved in some of the earliest litigation arising from the subprime mortgage crisis. At Perry Johnson, he has assisted dozens of investors in negotiating direction and indemnity agreements with RMBS trustees, initiated numerous mortgage putback cases, and served as counsel for investors in Article 77 proceedings concerning multi-billion-dollar RMBS settlements against Countrywide, Bank of America, and JPMorgan. He currently represents MLRN, LLC in a lawsuit in the Supreme Court of the State of New York against U.S. Bank, N.A., as Trustee for over 50 RMBS trusts.

Justin M. Ellis, Partner | MoloLamken LLP

Justin M. Ellis is a Partner at MoloLamken LLP in the firm’s New York office, where he litigates high-stakes business disputes from the filing of a complaint through appeal. He tries cases and argues appeals in federal and state courts, often on complex commercial and financial subjects, with particular experience in disputes involving bankruptcy, distressed debt, special situations, and structured finance, including RMBS, CMBS, and CDOs. Together with the MoloLamken team, Justin has recovered more than $2 billion for clients over the last five years.

• Education & Credentials

Justin earned his J.D. from the University of Chicago Law School, where he served as Articles Editor of the University of Chicago Law Review, and holds an A.M. from the University of Chicago Committee on International Relations and an A.B. from the University of Chicago. He is admitted to the New York Bar, the U.S. Courts of Appeals for the 2nd, 3rd, and 7th Circuits, and multiple U.S. District Courts.

• Recognition & Leadership

Justin has been ranked for more than five years as Band 1 by Chambers in plaintiffs-side RMBS litigation, named among Lawdragon’s 500 Leading Bankruptcy and Restructuring Lawyers, 500 Leading Plaintiff’s Financial Lawyers, and 500 Leading Litigators (2022), included in Benchmark Litigation’s 40 and Under Hot List, and recognized as a New York Rising Star by Super Lawyers. Legal 500 has described him as having “an unsurpassed encyclopedic knowledge of the law and all of its intricacies.”

• Professional Involvement

Justin is a member of the Federal Bar Council Pro Bono Advisory Council, the New York State Bar Association CPLR Committee, the Turnaround Management Association, and the American Bankruptcy Institute’s Bankruptcy Litigation Committee. He has authored articles in Law360 on fraudulent transfer, forum shopping for U.S. discovery, and litigation finance, and previously served as a law clerk to the Honorable Frank H. Easterbrook, Chief Judge of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Seventh Circuit.

• Experience

Justin has acted for trustees, certificate holders, and servicers across RMBS, CMBS, and CDO matters, including obtaining over $1.4 billion in recoveries for indenture trustees and investors in RMBS putback suits against mortgage originators and securitization sponsors. He has represented CMBS special servicers in multiple disputes over enforcement of trust agreement rights, served as counsel to investors in trust-instruction proceedings over the $8.5 billion Bank of America / Countrywide global settlement, and tried multiple matters involving liability management exercises on behalf of sponsors, issuers, and creditors.

Caleb Hayes-Deats, Partner | Lowell & Associates PLLC

Caleb Hayes-Deats is a Partner at Lowell & Associates, PLLC in Washington, D.C., where he serves as the firm’s first partner since its founding. An accomplished trial lawyer who has secured highly valued wins for his clients, Caleb represents companies and individuals in high-stakes government investigations and commercial disputes. His practice spans all levels of the judicial system and many industries, with particular experience under the False Claims Act, the Bank Secrecy Act, the Office of Foreign Assets Control’s sanctions programs, and the tax and securities laws.

• Education & Credentials

Caleb earned his J.D. from Columbia Law School and graduated with honors from Amherst College. He is admitted to the Bars of the District of Columbia and New York.

• Recognition & Leadership

Caleb has been recognized by The Legal 500, the National Law Journal, Super Lawyers, and Best Lawyers in America. He also received the Department of Justice’s John Marshall Award during his tenure as a federal prosecutor.

• Professional Involvement

Caleb has taught as a Lecturer in Law at Columbia Law School. He began his career as a law clerk for the Honorable Robert A. Katzmann of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit and the Honorable Jed S. Rakoff of the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of New York.

• Experience

Before joining Lowell & Associates, Caleb was a partner at a litigation boutique in D.C., where he handled trials, appeals, and government investigations. Previously, he served as an Assistant United States Attorney in the Civil Division of the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the Southern District of New York, where he had high-profile wins against Fortune 500 companies in cases under the False Claims Act, the Bank Secrecy Act, and the tax laws. He has recovered millions and secured injunctive relief on behalf of plaintiffs, both at trial and through settlement, and has helped defendants successfully navigate government investigations and civil litigation, sometimes simultaneously.

SESSION 1 – Government Enforcement and Whistleblower Exposure | 1:00pm – 2:00pm

Examine what federal and state enforcement agencies may pursue in response to commercial mortgage fraud, including bank fraud, FIRREA, federal and state False Claims Acts, post-GFC enforcement theories, and the proliferation of SEC and DOJ whistleblower programs.

BREAK | 2:00pm – 2:10pm

SESSION 2 – Pleading Commercial Mortgage Putback Claims | 2:10pm – 3:10pm

Apply two decades of residential mortgage putback precedent to the new wave of commercial mortgage repurchase litigation, including standing, repurchase clause triggers, key representations and warranties, establishing materiality, overcoming knowledge qualifiers, forensic reunderwriting, and positioning for settlement or trial.