U.S. DOJ Civil Rights Division News Update

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The Justice Department announced today that Texas Champion Bank of Alice, Texas, will establish uniform pricing policies, conduct employee training and pay $700,000 as part of a settlement to resolve allegations that it engaged in a pattern or practice of discrimination on the basis of national origin.

The settlement, which is subject to court approval, was filed in conjunction with the Justice Department’s complaint in the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of Texas. The complaint alleges that Texas Champion charged higher prices on unsecured consumer loans made to His panic borrowers through its branch offices in violation of the Equal Credit Opportunity Act (ECOA).

“The complaint filed today demonstrates that the Civil Rights Division is committed to fair lending enforcement across the entire spectrum of credit markets,” said Thomas E. Perez, Assistant Attorney General for the Justice Department’s Civil Rights Division. “We commend Texas Champion for working cooperatively with the Justice Department in reaching an appropriate resolution of this case.”

The Justice Department’s enforcement of fair lending laws is conducted by the Fair Lending Unit of the Housing and Civil Enforcement Section in the Civil Right Division. Since the Fair Lending Unit was established in February 2010, it has filed or resolved 24 lending matters under the Fair Housing Act, ECOA, and the Servicemembers Civil Relief Act. The settlements in these matters provide for a minimum of $660 million in monetary relief for impacted communities and more than 300,000 individual borrowers. The Attorney General’s annual reports to Congress subject to ECOA highlight the department’s accomplishments in fair lending and are available at www.justice.gov/crt/publications.

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