The Bankruptcy Protector
How much precedential value does an 1885 opinion of the U.S. Supreme Court deserve on a bankruptcy discharge issue?
That’s a central question in the Petition for a Writ of Certiorari before the U.S. Supreme Court in Bartenwerfer v. Buckly, Case No. 21-908 (“Distributed for Conference of 4/29/2022”).
Facts of the Case [Fn. 1]
A Petition for certiorari is before the U.S. Supreme Court in Speech & Language Center, LLC, and Chryssoula Marinos-Arsenis v. Horizon Blue Cross Blue Shield of New Jersey
Petition’s Question
The Question presented in the Petition is this:
The Supreme Court recently denied certiorari in Picard v. Citibank, in which the petitioner sought review of a Second Circuit decision on a seemingly obscure point of law: the pleading burden for “good faith” under Section 550 of the Bankruptcy Code. The Second Circuit’s decision is part of, and highlights, a larger, systemic problem in the evolution of bankruptcy law over the last decade—the multiplication of trustee-friendly interpretations of the Bankruptcy Code that, when combined, leave innocent subsequent transferees unfairly vulnerable to meritless clawback suits.
In a few months, Justice Stephen G. Breyer is set to retire from the U.S. Supreme Court.
The bankruptcy world will miss him.
The reason for discussing this subject now (instead of waiting for the retirement to actually happen) is this:
- The triumph of Justice Breyer’s Footnote 2 in Merit Management, as accomplished by a denial of certiorari on 2/22/2022.
What follows is a summary of four important Supreme Court bankruptcy opinions in which Justice Breyer played a significant role—starting with the Footnote 2 opinion.
The latest chapter in the Mainzeal saga played out last week with the Supreme Court hearing the directors' appeal (and the liquidators' cross-appeal) against the Court of Appeal's decision in Yan v Mainzeal Property and Construction Ltd (in liq) [2021] NZCA 99.
Imagine this: a U.S. District Court enters judgment in a case that’s “related to” a bankruptcy, and we want to file a motion for new trial or to amend the judgment.
So, which deadline applies to the motion:
This is how Tribune ends: not with a bang, but a whimper. The 12-year litigation saga, rooted in the spectacular failure of the media and sports conglomerate’s 2007 leveraged buyout, reached an end in late February with a curt “cert. denied” from the US Supreme Court.
Morgan Lewis was one of the firms that captained the defense for Tribune’s former shareholders. This post notes some lessons that we learned—and relearned.
Lesson One: Section 546(e)’s ‘New’ Safe Harbor
Supreme Court to Resolve Circuit Split on Constitutionality of U.S. Trustee Fee Hike
When existing interest holders attempt to retain ownership of a chapter 11 debtor after confirmation of a nonconsensual plan of reorganization, the Bankruptcy Code's plan confirmation requirements, including well-established rules regarding the classification and treatment of creditor claims and equity interests, can create formidable impediments to their reorganization strategy. In In re Platinum Corral, LLC, 2022 WL 127431 (Bankr. E.D.N.C. Jan. 13, 2022), the U.S.