Section 106(a) Doesn’t Waive Sovereign Immunity for State-Law-Based Section 544(b) Claims - The U.S. Supreme Court has significantly curtailed bankruptcy trustees’ powers in United States v. Miller, 145 S. Ct. 839 (2025). In...more
I am commonly asked by clients and other lawyers who are frustrated by typical collection efforts if we can place the would-be debtor into an involuntary bankruptcy. The short answer is, yes, it is often possible to place a...more
On January 24, 2025, the United States Bankruptcy Court for the Eastern District of Virginia entered an opinion denying a motion for a stay pending an appeal of a settlement motion in In re Hopeman Bros., Inc., No....more
A December 13, 2024, opinion from Judge Walrath held that a 2023 decision from the U.S. Supreme Court in Coinbase, Inc. v. Bielski, 599 U.S. 736 (2023) requires staying prosecution of an adversary proceeding when the...more
This author previously wrote an article published in Bloomberg Law regarding the Supreme Court’s decision to take up an appeal of a decision on the Tenth Circuit Court of Appeals in United States v. Miller. In Miller, the...more
In an opinion issued on Sept. 20 by the United States Bankruptcy Court for the District of New Mexico, Judge David T. Thuma held that the Rooker-Feldman doctrine does not prevent a bankruptcy court from determining whether...more
Congress enacted the Small Business Reorganization Act of 2019 (“SBRA”) on August 23, 2019, to facilitate the reorganization of smaller business debtors in the United States. The SBRA, codified as Subchapter V of Chapter 11...more
In an opinion on January 22nd, the Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals, in Matter of S. Coast Supply Co., 91 F.4th 376 (5th Cir. 2024), held that preference claims arising under 11 U.S.C. § 547 may be sold, reversing the dismissal...more
Federal Rule of Bankruptcy Procedure 9006(b) provides that, generally, “when an act is required to be done at or within a specified period by these rules or by a notice given thereunder or by order of court, the court for...more
In Matter of Imperial Petroleum Recovery Corp., 84 F.4th 264 (5th Cir. 2023), the Fifth Circuit was asked to address whether 28 U.S.C. § 1961(a) – the federal statute providing for post-judgment interest – applies in...more
In earlier posts, the Red Zone has discussed the Supreme Court’s ruling in Siegel v. Fitzgerald, 142 S. Ct. 1770 (2022), which held that increased U.S. Trustee quarterly fees for large Chapter 11 debtors between 2018 and 2020...more
In Matter of Texxon Petrochemicals, L.L.C., 67 F.4th 259 (5th Cir. 2023), the Fifth Circuit held that even if an appeal is equitably moot, the appellate court nonetheless has appellate jurisdiction to consider the merits of...more
Section 503(b)(9) Overview -
Ever since its addition to the Bankruptcy Code in 2005, there has been an ongoing debate as to whether electricity is a “good” or a “service” for purposes of section 503(b)(9). If electricity...more
On April 17, 2023, the Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals, in Matter of RE Palm Springs II, L.L.C., 2023 WL 2966520 (5th Cir. April 17, 2023), held that a senior lender who uses economic leverage and asserts its legal rights to...more
5/9/2023
/ 363 Sales ,
Bankruptcy Code ,
Bankruptcy Court ,
Commercial Bankruptcy ,
Debtors-in-Possession ,
Deed of Trust ,
Default ,
Lenders ,
Mechanics Lien ,
Priority Debt ,
Secured Debt
Back in June of 2022 we discussed the Tenth Circuit’s post-Sigel decision in John Q. Hammons Fall 2006 LLC v. U.S. Trustee (In re John Q. Hammons Fall 2006 LLC), 15 F.4th 1011 (10th Cir. Oct. 5, 2021), which held that the...more
In a previous blog post from June 2022, we discussed the Tenth Circuit’s post-Sigel decision in John Q. Hammons Fall 2006 LLC v. U.S. Trustee (In re John Q. Hammons Fall 2006 LLC), 15 F.4th 1011 (10th Cir. Oct. 5, 2021),...more
2/3/2023
/ Appellate Courts ,
Bankruptcy Appeals ,
Bankruptcy Court ,
Chapter 11 ,
Class Action ,
Commercial Bankruptcy ,
Fees ,
Jurisdiction ,
Overpayment ,
Refunds ,
SCOTUS ,
Siegel v. Fitzgerald ,
Trustees
Two recent decisions from circuit courts of appeal – the Fifth and Ninth – have addressed a question that does not arise often: in a solvent-debtor chapter 11 case, is the debtor required to pay post-petition interest...more
In a recent decision by the Tenth Circuit Bankruptcy Appellate Panel, the court held that a chapter 7 trustee could not sell an LLC membership interest pursuant to section 363 of the Bankruptcy Code because of a transfer...more
On August 18, 2022, the United States Bankruptcy Court for the Southern District of Indiana, in In re BWGS, LLC, No. 19-01487-JMC-7A, 2022 WL 3568045 (Bankr. S.D. Ind. Aug. 18, 2022), narrowly interpreted the safe harbor...more
9/28/2022
/ Acquisitions ,
Bankruptcy Code ,
Bankruptcy Court ,
Bridge Loan ,
Chapter 7 ,
ESOP ,
Fraudulent Transfers ,
Loan Payments ,
Motion to Dismiss ,
Safe Harbors ,
Section 546(e) ,
Stock Purchase Agreement
On June 6, 2022, the Supreme Court issued a unanimously ruling in Siegel v. Fitzgerald, 142 S. Ct. 1770 (U.S. June 6, 2022) that the increase in fees payable to the U.S. Trustee system in 2018 violated the uniformity aspect...more
Overview -
Although a discharge might not release third parties and protects only the debtor against a determination of personal liability, in In re Le Ctr. on Fourth, LLC, 17 F.4th 1326 (11th Cir. 2021), the Eleventh...more
In 2020, the United States Supreme Court issued a decision in Archdiocese of San Juan v. Acevedo Feliciano, 140 S. Ct. 696 (2020) strictly limiting the ability of federal courts to enter orders nunc pro tunc[GF1]....more
The Eleventh Circuit Court of Appeals recently issued an opinion in In re Centro Group, LLC, No. 21-11364, 2021 WL 5158001 (11th Cir. Nov. 5, 2021), in which it clarified the two separate and distinct standards for approving...more
Back in July, Craig Eller wrote in The Bankruptcy Protector about the continuing confusion amongst courts and litigants regarding the applicability of a 2018 increase in fees payable to the Office of the United States Trustee...more
Last month, the United States Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit, in Homaidan v. Sallie Mae, Inc., 3 F.4th 595 (2d Cir. 2021), affirmed a New York federal court's ruling that private student loans are not explicitly...more