Background

On 6 March 2020, the restructuring of Doncasters Group's 1.22 billion funded debt was completed. Following a successful non-core disposals program, the Doncasters Group (a leading worldwide supplier of high quality engineered components for the aerospace, industrial gas turbine and specialist automotive industries) operates from 12 principal manufacturing facilities based across the United Kingdom, the United States, Germany, Mexico and China.

Bankruptcy Rule 8002 and Federal Rule 58 can sometimes look like this. Carolina and Khaled have a much simpler solution.

When can a Federal Court employ a federal common law rule to make its decision in the case? Justice Gorsuch answer this in Rodriguez v. Fed. Deposit Ins. Corp., U.S., No. 18-1269, 2/25/20.[1] The answer . . . less often than you might think.

So you (allegedly) violated a bankruptcy court order. Whether the debtor alleges you violated the terms of a confirmed plan, failed to provide certain notices required by the bankruptcy rules, violated the discharge injunction, or any other court order, you may be wondering what potential redress the debtor may seek. Although many violations of bankruptcy court orders and rules do not provide for a private right of action, many debtors seek to have their rights vindicated (in the form of the greatest vindicator, cash) through an action for contempt.

In a recent decision, In re Philadelphia Entertainment and Development Partners, L.P., No. 14-000255-mdc (Bankr. E.D. Pa. Dec. 31, 2019), the Bankruptcy Court for the Eastern District of Pennsylvania held that state sovereign immunity does not prevent bankruptcy courts from hearing fraudulent transfer claims against states.

On January 13, 2020, the United States Bankruptcy Court for the District of Delaware issued an opinion in In re La Paloma Generating Company, LLC., Case No. 16-12700 [Adv. Pro.

Are the regimes of construction adjudication and insolvency incompatible? Recent Court of Appeal authority suggested that they are, but in Meadowside Building Developments Ltd (In Liquidation) v 12-18 Hill Street Management Company Ltd [2019] EWHC (TCC), Adam Constable QC sitting as a district judge in the high court has clarified the exceptional circumstances in which a company in liquidation can enforce an adjudicator’s decision in its favour.

The United States Supreme Court has granted certiorari on an issue that has greatly divided Circuit Courts of Appeal – the question of whether an entity that retains possession of a debtor’s property has an affirmative obligation to return that property to the debtor or trustee immediately upon the filing of the bankruptcy petition or risk being in violation of the automatic stay.

The Supreme Court, in Ritzen Group, Inc. v. Jackson Masonry, LLC,¹ issued an unanimous opinion last week, ruling that the Court of Appeals for the Sixth Circuit correctly denied the ability of creditor Ritzen Group Inc.

The United States District Court for the District of Delaware recently affirmed a Delaware bankruptcy court case that held that the mutuality requirement of section 553(a)¹The case declined to find mutuality in a triangular setoff between the debtor, a parent entity that owed the debtor money, and that entity’s subsidiary, which was a creditor.²