NOT RECOMMENDED FOR PUBLICATION
No. 17
- 2253 UNITED STATES COURT OF APPEALS FOR THE SIXTH CIRCUIT

SHERMAN M . HUBBARD , Plaintiff

- Appellant ,

v. SELECT PORTFOLIO SERVICING, INC. , e t al

. , Defendants

- Appellees

. ) ) ) ) ) ) ) ) ) ) ON APPEAL FROM THE UNITED STATES DISTRICT COURT FOR THE EASTERN DISTRICT OF MICHIGAN

BEFORE: BOGGS and GRIFFIN , Circuit Judges ; HOOD, District Judge .*
GRIFFIN , Circuit Judge

. After defaulting on his mortgage and seeing his request for a loan modification denied, Sh erman Hubbard sued his mortgagee , past mortgage servicer, and current mortgage servicer for breach of contract, breach of fiduciary duty, and fraud

. T he district court dismissed the case because Hubbard failed to state a claim and denied Hubbard’s request to amend his complaint to add new claims . Hubbard now challenges the denial of his request to amend

. We affirm.

I. Fourteen years ago, Na tionwide Lending Corporation loaned Hubbard $164,000 and secured the loan with a mortgage on a property Hubbard owned

. One year later, New Century

*The Honorable Joseph M. Hood, United States District Judge for the Eastern District of Kentucky , sitting by designation.No. 17

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Hubbard v. Select Portfolio Servicing, Inc., et. al.

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- Mortgage Corporation recorded an assignment of the mortgage to it. And at some point after that,
New Centur y assigned the mortgage to Deutsche Bank. Bank of America serviced the mortgage until 2012, when Select Portfolio Servicing took

over. In 2008, w hile Bank of America was the servicer, Hubbard file d for bankruptcy and paid $41,88 7 toward the mortgage. H ubbard never completed the bankruptcy; it wa s dismissed without discharge. Hubbard eventua lly defaulted on the mortgage. He then applied for a loan modification, which Select Portfolio Servicing denied because he failed to return the final modification documents by the deadline to do so. In April 2016 , Hubbard sued Select Portfolio Servicing, Bank of America, and Deutsche Bank for breach of contract, breach of fiduciary duty, and fraud. He brought the lawsuit pro se. His complaint contained few factu al allegations, and often failed to d istinguish between defendants

— instead alleging generally that “defendants” had done certain things. As to Deutsche Bank, Hubbard alleged only that it had purchased the mortgage. Regarding Bank of America, Hubbard alle ged that it had been assigned the mortgage (not that it had been the servicer), that it had neve r accounted for the money he paid during his bankruptcy, and that it had changed the locks on the property. And as to Select Portfolio Servicing, Hubbard alleged that it had offered him a loan modification

— conditioned on his completion of three trial payments

— that would set his payments below $1,375 per month and his interest rate between 2.75% and 3.75%, and th at he made the trial payments only to be offer ed a modification with payments of $1 , 375 per month and an interest rate of 8.78%. Defendants moved to dismiss the complaint or, in the alternative, for summary judgment. The district court referred the motions to a magistrate judge, who recommended gra nting both ofNo. 17

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- them. Hubbard objected. T he district court overruled the objections and granted the motions

. Hubbard also moved to amend his complaint to add additional claims, including a claim under the Racketeer Influenced and Corrupt Organizations Act (RICO). The dist rict court denied the motion.

II. On appeal, Hubbard is represented by counsel and devotes the majority of his opening brief
to (1) matters unrelated to whether his complaint stated a claim and (2) allegations never raised in his compla int. He then contends in a single paragraph that the district court erred in denying his motion to amend the complaint to add a RICO claim. Hubbard never mentions the three claims he asserted in his complaint, never outlines their elements, and never exp lains how his allegations stated a plausible claim to relief. But he does ask us to reverse the district court “completely” so he can “ke ep[] all of the issues alive.”
To the extent that Hubbard attempts to appeal the dismissal of his complaint, he has abandoned that challenge by presenting a pe rfunctory and underdeveloped argument

. See Vander Boegh v. EnergySolutions, Inc. , 772 F.3d 1056, 1063 (6th Cir. 2014). With no mention of the claims he raised, no explanation of how his allegations plausibly sta ted those claims, and no legal support

— indeed, with only a request that we reverse

— we have not hing to analyze. Hubbard may
not present a skeletal argument, leaving us to put flesh on its bones. See United States v. Hendrickson , 822 F.3d 812, 829 n.10 (6t h Cir. 2016)

. And even had he sufficiently developed his argument, by not including the challenge in his statement of issues he has failed to preserve the issue

. F ed. R. App. P. 28(a)(5) ; McCarthy v. Ameritech Publ’ g, Inc. , 763 F.3d 488, 494 (6th Cir.
2014 ).
T he district court denied Hubbard’s motion to amend his complaint after concluding that amendment would be futile. W e review that decision de novo. Parry v. Mohawk Motors of Mich.,No. 17

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- Inc. , 236 F.3d 299, 306 (6th Cir. 2000) . To state a RICO claim, Hubbard needed to plausibly allege : (1) the existence of an enterprise engaged in interstate or foreign commerce, or one affecting it; (2) the commission by members of the enterprise of two or more predicate offenses (those listed in 18 U.S.C. § 1961(1)); (3) a nexus between the enterp rise and the predicate offenses; and (4) an injury to Hubbard’s business or property that the enterprise and its rac keteering activity caused. See Frank v. D’Ambrosi , 4 F.3d 1378, 1385 (6th Cir. 1993). Hubbard never outlin es the elements of a RICO claim , and he never explains how his proposed am ended complaint plausibly states such a claim; he simply refers us to George v. Urban Settlement Services , 833 F.3d 1242 (10th Cir. 2016). Although the George court held that the plaintiffs there had stated a RICO claim in similar factual circumstances , id . at 1246, the court’s analysis shows why amendment here would have been futile

. In George , w hen analyzing whether the plaintiffs had sufficiently alleged th e commission of two or more predicate offenses, the Tenth Circuit found that the plaintiffs had sufficiently alleged the commission of mail fraud and wire fraud ( both of which Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 9(b) subject s to a hei ghtened pleading

standard )

. Id . at 1253

– 57 . The allegations held up, the court reasoned, because the plaintiffs had identified the defendants’ employees by name; had given specific dates when those employees made false statements; had listed specific actions taken in reliance on the false statements; had outlined specific injuri es that the false statements caused; and had explain ed how the false
statements furthered the enterprise’s goal. Id . at 1256

– 57

. Here, by contrast, Hubbard’s allegations of mail fraud and wire fraud cont ain ed only general assertions of statements made to him and “thousands of homeowners.” At a minimum, Hubbard needed to allege the time, place, and content of the false statements he relie d on; the fraudulent scheme; defendants’ fraudulent intent; and the injury that the fraud caused. Coffey v.No. 17

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- Foamex L.P. , 2 F.3d 157, 161

– 62 (6th Cir. 1993) . Because he did not make any of those allegations , allowing him to amend his complaint would have been futile; Hubbard did not plausibly and specifically all ege the commission of two or more predicate offenses, so his propo sed amended complaint failed to state a RICO claim.

III. For these reasons, we affirm the district court’s judgment.