The Bankruptcy Law Firm, Prof. Corp.
Wolf Metals Inc. v. Rand Pac. Sales, Inc., 4 Cal. App. 5th 698
Wolf Metals Inc. v. Rand Pac. Sales, Inc., 4 Cal. App. 5th 698 (2016), a published California Court of Appeals decision, the California Court of Appeal held that a judgment creditor could not amend a default judgment to add an additional individual judgment debtor under an “alter ego” theory, because doing so would violate that person’s due process rights, although adding a successor corporation to the judgment was permissible. Judgment creditors often want to add a nondebtor individual to a state court default judgment, because the corporation the judgment is against files bankruptcy, or is otherwise “uncollectible”. FACTS: Wolf Metals…
U.S. Bank N.A. v. The Village at Lakeridge, LLC
U.S. Bank N.A. v. The Village at Lakeridge, LLC (In re The Village at Lakeridge, LLC), 814 F.3d 993 (9th Cir. 2016): Held that purchasing a claim from an insider of the bankruptcy debtor does NOT necessarily result in the person/entity purchasing the claim becoming an insider. United States Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit held that a vote on a plan of reorganization submitted by a non-insider claimant was not to be disregarded under Bankruptcy Code section 1129(a)(10) merely because the claimant purchased the claim from an insider. FACTS: The debtor owned a commercial real estate development in…
In re Rexford Properties, LLC, ___BR___, 2016 Westlaw 5416443 (Bankr. C.D.Cal.2016)
In re Rexford Properties, LLC, ___BR___, 2016 Westlaw 5416443 (Bankr. C.D.Cal.2016): A bankruptcy court in California has held that the separate classification of a group of trade creditors in a Chapter 11 plan had to be based on a “legitimate business or economic justification,” but the debtor did not have to show that the special treatment of that group was “critical, essential, or necessary” to the reorganization. [.] FACTS: A Chapter 11 debtor negotiated a reorganization plan, under which certain of its unsecured creditors (primarily trade creditors) would be separately classified. The members of that class would be paid in…
Retailers’ Free Speech Challenge to Surcharge/discount Distinction for Describing Price Differences for Credit Card and Cash Sales
Retailers’ Free Speech Challenge to Surcharge/discount Distinction for Describing Price Differences for Credit Card and Cash Sales (US Supreme Court docket certarari granted on 10-20-16, and US Supreme Court heard argument of case on 1/11/17 :U.S. Supreme Court on 1/11/17 struggled over how to decide a challenge to a state law barring retailers from charging more to buy with credit instead of cash, debating whether it merely regulates prices or violates merchants’ constitutional rights. The eight justices heard an hour of arguments in an appeal brought by merchants to a lower court’s ruling upholding the New York law, which is…
Beware of Online Bankruptcy Solicitations
BEWARE OF SUPPOSED “NATIONAL” LAW FIRM (PRINCE LAW FIRM, LLC) WHICH ADVERTISED ON INTERNET, SOLICITING FOR BANKRUPTCY CASES, BUT WHICH WAS NOT A NATIONAL LAW FIRM, AND WHICH WAS FARMING THE CASES OUT TO LAW FIRMS IN VARIOUS STATES, SOMETIMES WITH BAD RESULTS: In re Aimee Dawn Futreal and Judge A. Robbins, US Trustee for Region Four, Movant v. Brent Barbour and Barry Proctor and Prince Law Firm, LLC, Respondents; and In re Micah Jerimey Repass and Holly Leigh Repass, Debtors, and Judgy A. Robbins, US Trustee for Region Four, Movant v. Brent Barbour and Barry Proctor and Prince Law,…
Midland Funding, LLC v. Johnson, St. Ct., No. 16-348
In Midland Funding, LLC v. Johnson, St. Ct., No. 16-348, appeal docketed Sept. 16, 2016: US Supreme Court in 2017 will hear and decide a bankruptcy case involving a debt collection agency and a consumer bankruptcy debtor. Issue is whether the Consumer Financial Protection Act prohibits a debt collection agency/creditor from filing a proof of claim, in a bankruptcy case, that is barred by the statute of limitations. More than two years into a litigation effort challenging the credit and collection industry’s practice of filing time-barred proofs of claim in consumer bankruptcy cases, all eyes are on the U.S. Supreme…
Blixseth v. Brown (In re Yellowstone Mountain Club, LLC), ___F.3d ___, 2016 WL6936595 (9th Cir. 11/28/2016)
Blixseth v. Brown (In re Yellowstone Mountain Club, LLC), ___F.3d ___, 2016 WL6936595 (9th Cir. 11/28/2016): In Blixseth, the Ninth Circuit Extends Barton doctrine, to Protect Creditors’ Committee Members In Blixseth, the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals became the first US appeals court to hold that the Supreme Court’s Barton doctrine, barring suits against receivers and trustees without permission from the appointing court, also protects creditors’ committee members from claims based on actions taken within the scope of authority. The appeal involved Timothy Blixseth, former owner of the bankrupt Yellowstone Mountain Club LLC, who used some proceeds from a loan…
National Association of Consumer Bankruptcy Attorneys files Amicus Brief, arguing against the 11th Circuit US Court of Appeals Judicial Estoppel Doctrine
NCBRC has filed an amicus brief in the Eleventh Circuit on behalf of the NACBA membership to address the issue of that circuit’s approach to judicial estoppel. Slater v. U.S. Steel, No. 12-15568 (filed October 24, 2016). Twenty one months after filing an employment discrimination suit in federal district court against her former employer, U.S. Steel, Sandra Slater filed for bankruptcy. (The original case was filed under chapter 7 and later converted to chapter 13). She failed to list the pending federal case in her bankruptcy schedules. U.S. Steel then moved the district court to bar the discrimination suit based…
In re Kipnis, ___BF___, 2016 Westlaw 4543772 (Bankruptcy Court. S.D. Fla. 2016)
A bankruptcy court in Florida has held that a trustee had the power to borrow the Internal Revenue Service’s 10 year statute of limitations in pursuing fraudulent transfer litigation on behalf of the estate. FACTS: An individual owed back taxes to the Internal Revenue Service. In an attempt to avoid paying those assessments, he allegedly engaged in fraudulent transfers of his assets. Roughly 10 years after those transfers, he filed a bankruptcy petition. His trustee then asserted fraudulent transfer claims against his transferees under 11 U.S.C.A. §544(b). They moved to dismiss on the ground that the claims were time barred,…
In re Archdiocese of Milwaukee (Official Committee of Unsecured Creditors v. Archdiocese of St. Paul and Minneapolis), ___BR___, 2016 WL7115977 (US DC ED Wisconsin 2016)
In re Archdiocese of Milwaukee (Official Committee of Unsecured Creditors v. Archdiocese of St. Paul and Minneapolis), ___BR___, 2016 WL7115977 (US DC ED Wisconsin 2016): US District Court affirmed, on appeal, the bankruptcy court’s denial of substantive consolidation. The Bankruptcy Court decision is 483 BR 693, 2012 WL 6093494 (Bky Ct. ED Wisconsin 2012). The Bankruptcy Judge had denied motion of creditors committee to substantively consolidate non-bankrupt catholic schools and parishes into the bankruptcy case of the Catholic Archdiocese in which those non-bankrupt catholic schools and parishes were nocated. On appeal, the US District Court, ED Wis 2016, agreed that…