New Cases - Week of September 21, 2009

New Cases For the Week of September 21, 2009 - September 25, 2009

Brought to you by BKINFORMATION.COM - The Source for Business Bankruptcy Information on the Internet

Click here to search prior New Opinion summaries.

September 25, 2009
Case	Court	Holding

In re Teligent, Inc.
(DBN)

Bankr. SD NY

Statements made in mediation are confidential and privileged. Although confidentiality can be breached upon a showing of compelling need, mere relevance of the statements in another litigation is insufficient.

A law firm sued for malpractice failed to meet the high burden of obtaining mediation statements realted to settlement of the matter in which the law firm formerly represented the defendant.

In re Circuit City Stores, Inc.
(DBN)

Bankr. ED VA

The definition of "goods" set forth in the UCC should be employed in fashioning a federal definition for that term in § 503(b)(9). The "predominate purpose test," developed and applied by the majority of courts to determine whether the UCC is applicable to hybrid contracts calling for the delivery of both goods and services, should be used to determine whether a claim involves the selling of goods and is, therefore, entitled to an administrative priority under § 503(b)(9).

September 24, 2009
Case	Court	Holding

In re Smith (DBN)	7th Cir.	Where an unscheduled creditor's litigation counsel received notice of defendant/debtor's bankruptcy (via defendant's notice of bankruptcy) in time to file a proof of claim or contest discharge, the claim was nevertheless nondischarable because due process requires that the notice must not only reasonably convey required information, but it must also afford a reasonable time for those interested to make their appearance. Where the bankruptcy notice contained no information about deadlines and was received 16 days before the deadlines expired, creditor's counsel had inadequate time to ascertain creditor's bankruptcy rights, and creditor's claim was nondischargeable under 11 USC 523(a)(3)(B).

September 21, 2009
Case	Court	Holding

In re Ames Dept. Stores, Inc. (DBN)	2nd Cir.	11 USC section 502(d) (disallowing claims by avoidance recipients) does not bar allowance of administrative expenses within the scope of section 503(b). The structure and context of section 502(d) suggests that Congress intended it to differentiate between claims and administrative expenses, and not to apply to the latter.