Key Lawmaker Received Countrywide Loans
A powerful House Democrat who has turned down a Republican's call to subpoena records of a mortgage program at Countrywide Financial Corp. received two home loans from the lender.

Some information in the lawmaker's mortgage documents raises the possibility they were made through the program, which provided loans to public figures and other favored borrowers often at lower interest rates or with lower origination fees than were available to the general public.

The loans were made to Rep. Edolphus Towns of New York, who heads the House Oversight and Government Reform committee. The panel's ranking Republican, California Rep. Darrell Issa, has been pushing to have the committee subpoena mortgage records showing who received loans through Countrywide's VIP program -- operated under former Chief Executive Angelo Mozilo and known within the company as "Friends of Angelo."

The mortgage documents on the loans to Mr. Towns contain a Countrywide address and branch number that correspond to the VIP program....

...Mr. Issa said that based on his staff's investigation, he believes the names of many VIP loan recipients aren't publicly available. But Mr. Towns has turned down the Republican request to subpoena the records from Bank of America....

...The mortgage documents on the Florida refinancing and the Brooklyn loan from 2003 both show they were prepared at Countrywide's Branch 850. In June, Republican House staffers interviewed Robert Feinberg, who worked on the VIP operation from 2000 to 2004. According to a transcript, Mr. Feinberg said each Countrywide branch office had a numeric designation; "850" signified the VIP operation. That number "was always your clue. That's the designation as a VIP because that's the VIP processing unit, 850," he said.

Elana Goldstein, an attorney for Mr. Feinberg at Salerno & Associates, reiterated that he told House investigators that 850 was the designation for the VIP unit....