"When a federal court gives its approval to a plan that allows a party to put its hands into other people's pockets, the ones with the pockets are entitled to be fully heard and to have their legitimate objections addressed." Insurers have standing in an asbestos/silica bankruptcy case where plan will be funded from insurance.

Article III standing and standing under the Bankruptcy Code (i.e., 1109(b)) are effectively co-extensive. The benchmark for bankruptcy court standing is whether the party seeking standing has: (i) some specific, `identifiable trifle' of injury, (ii) a personal stake in the outcome of the controversy or (iii) legally protected interests that could be affected by the debtor's plan.

Insurers' standing in an asbestos bankruptcy case can be thwarted by "insurance neutrality provisions" that leave the insurers coverage obligations unaffected. However, where a plan increases insurers' coverage exposure, insurers have standing.

Although standing can dwindle as harm becomes speculative, the contingent nature of the harm is not dispositive of standing. Where an injury causes a tangible disadvantage to a party, standing exists. The insurers suffered a tangible disadvantage from the debtor's plan. Although coverage defenses were preserved, the creation of the silica trust caused the insured to be faced with over 4,600 silica claims, as opposed to 169 claims before the plan. The plan-triggered explosion of new claims creates an entirely new set of administrative costs, including the investigative burden of finding any meritorious suits in the haystack of potentially fraudulent ones. Those costs will be enormous, even if the insurers never pay a single dollar of indemnity.

Standing is also affected by the presence of facts indicating that the integrity of the justice system is threatened. Here, there are nonfrivolous allegations that the debtor, in collusion with asbestos/silica claimants, "sold out" the insurers by setting up a system in which they would pay for newly ginned-up silica claims in exchange for the asbestos claimants casting their votes in favor of the plan. Since no party other than the insurers appears to have incentive to complain of these disturbing circumstances, the insurers have such standing.

Where, as here, a debtor has a direct interest in a depleting D&O policy (i.e., the policy provides liability protection to the debtor as well as D&Os), the policy proceeds are property of the estate.

However, the directors and officers are entitled to relief from stay to receive payment of defense costs in a suit brought against them by the debtor. If the debtor was seeking to protect depletion of the policy to address liability claims asserted against the debtor, relief from stay might not be appropriate. However, here the debtor was seeking to prevent depletion of the policy to maximize its insurance recovery as a plaintiff against the directors and officers. Under those circumstances, relief from stay in favor of the directors and officers is appropriate.

Where a land sales agreement stated specific dates and times for performance, provided a cure period if payment was not received when due, and stated that if payment was not received within the cure period, the payor would be in default, time was of the essence in the contract and the debtor/seller's failure to close by the stated date (which was after the debtor's bankruptcy filing) was an incurable default. The bankruptcy court erred in allowing assumption of this contract.