Royal Street Bistro LLC v. Arrowhead Capital Finance Ltd. (In re Royal Street Bistro LLC)
Royal Street Bistro LLC v. Arrowhead Capital Finance Ltd. (In re Royal Street Bistro LLC), 24-30732 (5th Cir. Nov. 17, 2025), the US Court of Appeals for the 5th Circuit rules that an appellant’s failure to attach a copy of the judgment the appellant is appealing, to the appellant’s notice of appeal, is not ‘so egregious’ as to warrant dismissal of the appeal. Failing to attach a copy of the judgment to the notice of appeal isn’t jurisdictional and isn’t grounds in itself for dismissing an appeal, the Fifth Circuit said in a November 17 opinion.
In a lawsuit in bankruptcy court by one creditor against another creditor, the appellants filed a notice of appeal on time. However, the appellants did not attach a copy of the judgment to the notice of appeal, as required by Bankruptcy Rule 8003(a)(3)(B).
The clerk gave the appellants a deadline for filing a corrected notice of appeal. Ten days after the deadline and 21 days after entry of the judgment, the appellants filed a corrected notice of appeal, this time including the judgment.
The appellee filed a motion to dismiss the appeal. The district court dismissed the appeal for lack of jurisdiction, citing the appellants’ failure to attach the judgment before the deadline. Alternatively, the district court dismissed the appeal as an exercise of discretion, based on the appellants’ failure to comply with the Bankruptcy Rules and the deadline for amending the notice of appeal.
The appellants appealed and won reinstatement of the appeal in an opinion by Circuit Judge Irma Carrillo Ramirez.
What’s Jurisdictional and What’s Not
Appellate jurisdiction is conferred by 28 U.S.C. § 158(c)(2), which provides,
An appeal . . . shall be taken in the same manner as appeals in civil proceedings generally are taken to the courts of appeals from the district courts and in the time provided by Rule 8002 of the Bankruptcy Rules.
In turn, Bankruptcy Rule 8002(a)(1) requires the filing of a notice of appeal within 14 days from the entry of judgment. The Fifth Circuit held that “the time limit [in Rule 8002] is jurisdictional” because 28 U.S.C. § 158 “expressly requires that the notice of appeal be filed under the time limit provided in Rule 8002.” In re Berman-Smith, 737 F.3d 997, 1003 (5th Cir. 2013).
Parsing the rules further, Judge Ramirez cited Bankruptcy Rule 8003(a)(3)(B) for requiring that the notice of appeal “be accompanied by the judgment — or the appealable order or decree — from which the appeal is taken.”
“This is not a jurisdictional prerequisite because,” Judge Ramirez said, “unlike Rule 8002, ‘Rule 8003(a)(3)(B) does not follow from a clear federal statute.’ In re Serta Simmons Bedding, L.L.C., 125 F.4th 555, 575 (5th Cir. 2024), as revised (Jan. 21, 2025), as revised (Feb. 14, 2025) (citation modified).” To read ABI’s report on Serta Simmons, click here and here.
Judge Ramirez continued:
“Since a failure to attach the appealed-from judgment is not a failure to timely file the notice of appeal, such a failure does not mandate dismissal.” Id.; see, e.g., In re Mahadevan, 2024 WL 3292744, at ∗1 (5th Cir. 2024).
Because the appellant had filed the notice of appeal before the deadline, Judge Ramirez held that “the district court had jurisdiction over the appeal.”
No Abuse of Discretion
In addition to basing dismissal on the appellants’ failure to file the judgment on time, the district court dismissed the appeal as a matter of discretion. The appellants contended that the district court abused its discretion.
Addressing discretion, Judge Ramirez turned to Bankruptcy Rule 8003(a)(2), entitled “Failure to Take Any Other Step.” It provides that an “appellant’s failure to take any step other than timely filing a notice of appeal does not affect the appeal’s validity, but is ground only for the district court . . . to act as it considers appropriate, including dismissing the appeal.”
“The rule makes clear that, other than an untimely notice of appeal which mandates dismissal, the district court has the authority to dismiss an appeal for infractions of the bankruptcy rules,” Judge Ramirez said, citing the Fifth Circuit. She went on to say that “dismissal is typically unwarranted for harmless bankruptcy rule violations, and parties should not invariably suffer for the errors of counsel.”
In exercising discretion, Judge Ramirez quoted the Fifth Circuit and said:
[D]istrict courts should consider, among other things, “what sanctions are appropriate, the prejudicial effect of delay on the appellees, and whether the appellant has exhibited ‘obstinately dilatory conduct.’”
In the case on appeal Judge Ramirez observed that “the district court did not consider any sanction short of dismissal,” again citing Serta Simmons. She noted how the district court “found that dismissal was warranted because [the appellants] were sophisticated parties who had appealed other orders in the bankruptcy case, and . . . provided no reason for not timely correcting the deficient notice of appeal despite receiving notice and an opportunity to do so.”
In addition, Judge Ramirez noted how the deficiency notice from the clerk did not warn about dismissal. Furthermore, the appellee “does not assert that it suffered any injury from the delayed filing other than the enforcement of the bankruptcy court’s judgment.”
Because dismissal is an “extremely severe sanction,” Judge Ramirez quoted the Fifth Circuit for saying that dismissal “should ‘be reserved for the most egregious of situations.’” In the case on appeal, she could not say that the failure to attach a copy of the judgment to the notice of appeal “was so egregious as to merit the district court’s dismissal of the appeal.”
Finding abuse of discretion, Judge Ramirez reversed and remanded for further proceedings consistent with the opinion. She declined to address the merits of the appeal.