In the case of In re Santa Ysabel Resort and Casino, the Bankruptcy Court for the Southern District of California heard arguments on September 4, 2012, as to whether the alleged debtor, a tribal casino, was eligible for bankruptcy protection. The court concluded the casino was not an eligible debtor under the Bankruptcy Code.

A Georgia bankruptcy court has held that notwithstanding the discharge of an individual in his individual bankruptcy proceeding, the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation (FDIC) may file suit against the individual as a former officer of a failed bank so long as the applicable D&O policy covers defense costs and the FDIC’s recovery is limited to insurance proceeds.  In re Hayden, 2012 WL 3597422 (Bankr. N.D. Ga. July 6, 2012).

Whether you are a John Donne, Ernest Hemingway or Metallica fan, the above clause rings a bell. Last week the Court of Appeal for Western Australia joined those “Riding the Lighting” and provided its own musings on “For Whom the Bells Tolls” down under. Rather than affirming that the bell tolls for the infamous Spanish guerrilla fighters or a tortured metaphysical poet, the Australian court provided a new answer: The Bell [decision] tolls for “would be” secured lenders.

On August 2, 2012, the Court of Appeals for the 5th Circuit issued a decision in Lightfoot v. MXEnergy Electric, Inc. (In re MBS Management Servs., Inc.). No. 11-30553, (5th Cir. Aug. 2, 2012).

As NASA engineers breathe a sigh of relief after the “seven minutes of terror” that was the rover Curiosity’s landing on Mars, recipients of payments under commodity forward contracts can—at least in the Fifth Circuit—rest assured that agreements that meet the basic definition of forward contract contained in section 101(25) of the Bankruptcy Code will be protected from preference liability should their counterparties find themselves in bankruptcy. Last Thursday, in Lightfoot v. MXEnegry Electric, Inc. (In re MBS Management Servs., Inc.). No. 11-30553 (5th Cir. Aug.

The United States District Court for the Central District of California has held that, under California law, claims for restitutionary relief are uninsurable as a matter of law. Dobson v. Twin City Fire Ins. Co., et al., 2012 WL 2708392 (C.D. Cal. July 5, 2012). Additionally, the court held that individual insureds breached a policy’s no-voluntary payment provision by settling an underlying claim without insurer consent and that the insureds’ breach was not excused by the carrier’s failure to advance defense costs.

The United States Bankruptcy Court for the District of Delaware, applying federal law, has held that a Liquidation Trustee and a Litigation Trustee (the Trustees) did not have standing to object to the disbursal of policy proceeds in an insurer’s interpleader action because they had no existing claims or realistic potential claims for coverage under the policy. Federal Insurance Co. v. DBSI, Inc., 2012 WL 2501090 (Bankr. D. Del. June 27, 2012).

Applying Georgia law, the United States Bankruptcy Court for the Northern District of Georgia has voided a surplus lines policy on the grounds that the insured, a purported hedge fund management firm, concealed that it was operating a Ponzi scheme, submitted an inaccurate financial statement, and misrepresented that its investment funds were “stable.”Perkins v. Am. Int’l Specialty Lines Ins. Co., 2012 WL 2105908 (Bankr. N.D. Ga. Apr. 3, 2012).

On May 24, 2012, the United States District Court for the Southern District of New York (District Court) issued an opinion with significant ramifications for law firms seeking to hire former partners from bankrupt law firms. At issue was whether, under New York partnership law, the law firms that hired former partners of Coudert Brothers LLP (Coudert), a dissolved and bankrupt law partnership, must account for profits that the former Coudert partners earned while completing work on open client matters they took with them from Coudert.

Today, the Supreme Court of the United States issued its much awaited decision in RadLAX Gateway Hotel, LLC v. Amalgamated Bank, 566 U.S. ______ (2012). The noteworthy decision resolves any uncertainty surrounding a secured creditor’s right to credit bid in a sale under a chapter 11 plan which arose after cases like Philadelphia Newspapers 599 F.3d 298 (3d Cir. 2010) curtailed the right.