If, like me, you have ever scratched your head in confusion while preparing your taxes and thought to yourself – “I can’t believe the IRS takes such an absurd position on xyz tax exemption I want to use – who comes up with these crazy positions?” – then you might take some pleasure in a recent opinion from Judge Gross of the United States Bankruptcy Court for the District of Delaware calling an argument made by the IRS “strained and a bit confusing.” You read that right.

The U.S. Supreme Court will hear oral argument today inU.S. Bank National Association v. Village at Lakeridge (15-1509). At issue in the case is whether the appropriate standard of review for determining non-statutory insider status is the de novo standard of review applied by the U.S. Courts of Appeals for the 3rd, 7th and 10th Circuits, or the clearly erroneous standard of review adopted for the first time by the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 9th Circuit in Village at Lake Ridge.

In In re Short Bark Industries Inc., 17-11502 (Bankr. D. Del. Sept. 11, 2017), Judge Kevin Gross of the United States Bankruptcy Court for the District of Delaware read the Supreme Court’s holding in Jevic narrowly in connection with a settlement of a dispute on DIP financing.

The bankruptcy bar is abuzz following the Supreme Court’s recent decision in Czyzewski v. Jevic Holding Corp., 15-649, 2017 BL 89680, 85 U.S.L.W. 4115 (Sup. Ct. March 22, 2017), holding that bankruptcy courts may not approve structured dismissals that do not adhere to the Bankruptcy Code’s priority scheme.

Being inexperienced can contribute to getting into disciplinary trouble, but it can also be a mitigating factor in a bar disciplinary case. That’s the message of a recent opinion of the Oklahoma Supreme Court, which imposed a six month suspension from state practice as reciprocal discipline on a lawyer who had already been suspended from federal bankruptcy court practice for five years.

Raising the risk?

My spouse and I visited Chicago years ago, and confusedly started driving the wrong way down a one-way street.  We were promptly pulled over by one of the Windy City’s finest.  I gave him my best smile, and said, “Sorry, officer, we’re from out of town.”  He grunted, “Don’t they have one-way streets where you come from?”  But he didn’t give us a ticket.  A recent disciplinary opinion out of Oklahoma, involving a tech-challenged bankruptcy lawyer, brings the story to mind.

E-filing woes bring bankruptcy court discipline

When you start planning to leave your firm for greener pastures, lots of ethics issues can crop up (bad pun). One of the most acute issues is if you get an offer to join a firm that is on the opposite side of a matter you are already handling. That was the situation in a recent bankruptcy case, In re US Bentonite, Inc., and it led the court to order the firm representing a Chapter 11 debtor-in-possession to disgorge several months’ worth of fees.