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New Cases For the Week of November 5, 2001 -
November 9, 2001
Brought to you by BKINFORMATION.COM
- The Source for Business Bankruptcy Information on the Internet
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November 9, 2001
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Case
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Court
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Holding
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In
re Canal Place Limited Partnership
(DBN Subscription Required) |
8th Cir.
BAP |
The
bankruptcy court did not err in refusing to reopen a closed
single-asset Chapter 11 case postconfirmation.
Confirmation revested the assets of the estate in the
debtor. Hence, reopening would have been pointless,
since there were no remaining assets to administer. |
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November 8, 2001
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Case
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Court
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Holding
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In
re Cantrell
(DBN Subscription Required) |
9th Cir.
BAP |
Although
a prepetition default judgment can sometimes have preclusive effect for
dischargeability purposes under California law, such a
judgment cannot be preclusive where the debtor was not personally
served with process, and did not know about the litigation
until after the default judgment had been entered.
California law creates an express statutory
trust (sufficient for nondischargeability purposes under 11
USC 523(a)(4)) owed by a partner to co-partners, however
no such express trust is imposed under California law
against an officer or director of a corporation. Thus a
breach of fiduciary duty committed by an officer or director
of a California corporation in such capacity is not a proper
basis for a claim of nondischargeability under section
523(a)(4). |
In
re LPM Corp.
(DBN Subscription Required) |
9th Cir.
BAP |
A
creditor who obtained a postpetition writ of execution from
the bankruptcy court in connection with a postpetition section
365(d)(3) rent obligation violated the automatic stay when it
levied on the debtor in possession's bank account to enforce
such writ. Enforcement actions against property of the
estate, even as to postpetition obligation, are barred by the
stay.
An administrative claim under § 365(d)(3)
does not entitle a landlord to superpriority status if the
estate is administratively insolvent |
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November 7, 2001
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Case
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Court
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Holding
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In
re Federated Department Stores
(DBN Subscription Required) |
6th Cir. |
Because
a city "assessed" certain real property taxes within
the meaning of 11 U.S.C. § 508(a)(8) after the debtor's
bankruptcy petition was filed, the debtor's estate
"incurred" the property taxes. Because the debtor's
estate, not the debtor, incurred the property taxes, the taxes
should be paid as an administrative expense |
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November 6, 2001
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Case
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Court
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Holding
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Hamilton
v. State Farm
(DBN Subscription Required)
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9th Cir. |
Judicial
estoppel operates to prevent a party from taking clearly
inconsistent positions in a judicial action or actions.
The doctrine applies to positions taken in separate judicial
actions, as well as positions taken within the same judicial
action. The doctrine further requires that the original court
have "relied upon" or "accepted" the
original position.
The court did not err in holding that a
Chapter 7 debtor's failure to schedule his bad faith and
breach of contract claims against an insurance company barred
the later assertion of those claims after the postdischarge
dismissal of his bankruptcy case. The debtor claimed
that the bankruptcy court could not have relied on or accepted
his position that no such claim existed (arising by
implication from the omission of the claims from the
schedules), since the bankruptcy case had been dismissed
and the discharge vacated. The Court disagreed, holding
that even though the discharge was vacated "The
bankruptcy court may 'accept' the debtor's assertions by
relying on the debtor's nondisclosure of potential claims in
many other ways." |
In
re Anderson
(DBN Subscription Required) |
8th Cir.
BAP |
Under
Minnesota law, a debtor's exemption in a pension plan is
limited to plans directly traceable to the debtor's
employment. Consequently, the court did not err in
upholding a Chapter 7 trustee's objection to a debtor's
exemption of pension rights awarded to the debtor in his
ex-spouse's pension plan as part of a property division in a
divorce. |
In
re Kujawa
(DBN Subscription Required) |
8th Cir. |
The
court did not err in imposing attorneys fees sanctions against
a debtor's former attorney who unethically assisted in the
preparation and filing of an involuntary petition against the
debtor. However, since sanctions must be narrowly tailored to
achieve the required deterrent effect, the court did err
in imposing an additional $100,000 punitive sanction on
account of the attorney's refusal to provide detailed net
worth information. |
In
re Delta Engineering International
(DBN Subscription Required) |
8th Cir. |
The
fact that "the time to file a notice of appeal in every
other forum with which plaintiffs' attorney is familiar is 30
or more days" does not constitute a basis for enlarging
the 10-day appellate period to allow an appeal filed 30 days
after the entry of a bankruptcy court. |
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November 5, 2001
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Case
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Court
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Holding
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In
re Burns
(DBN Subscription Required) |
6th Cir.
BAP |
Avoidance
and recovery under 11 USC 550 are two separate legal
concepts. In some circumstances, avoidance alone
accomplishes a completed result, making utilization of section
550 unnecessary. Where the trustee avoided a lien under
section 544(a), the lien was avoided and automatically
preserved for the benefit of the estate, all without ever
triggering section 550. Because section 550 was never
implicated in the avoidance, the owner of the lien had no
protection under that statute as a good faith transferee. |
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