The U.S. Supreme Court ruled on March 22, 2017, in Czyzewski v. Jevic Holding Corp., that without the consent of affected creditors, bankruptcy courts may not approve "structured dismissals" providing for distributions that "deviate from the basic priority rules that apply under the primary mechanisms the [Bankruptcy] Code establishes for final distributions of estate value in business bankruptcies."

(Bankr. E.D. Ky. Mar. 24, 2017)

The bankruptcy court grants in part and denies in part the defendant’s motion to dismiss in this fraudulent and preferential transfer avoidance action. The trustee’s amended complaint failed to state claims based on certain transfers, but did state a preferential transfer claim.

Judge: Wise

Attorneys for Trustee: Bingham Greenebaum Doll LLP, Claude R.Bowles, Jr., Daniel J. Donnellon, Alex S. Rodger

Attorneys for Defendant: Ross M. Bagley, Gideon Cashman, Eric M. Fishman, Adam R. Kegley

The filing of a bankruptcy case puts in place an automatic injunction, or stay, that halts most actions by creditors against a debtor. But can a creditor violate the automatic stay by not acting? The Tenth Circuit recently addressed the issue in WD Equipment, LLC v. Cowen (In re Cowen), adding to the split of authority on the issue.

The immediate effect of Jevic will be that practitioners may no longer structure dismissals in any manner that deviates from the priority scheme of the Bankruptcy Code without the consent of impaired creditors.

Seyfarth Synopsis: A bankruptcy court overseeing an employer’s Chapter 11 bankruptcy proceeding allowed the employer to pay certain unsecured creditors before paying Worker Adjustment And Retraining Notification Act (“WARN”) creditors – workers who had sued the company – monies owed pursuant to a judgment, even though the bulk of the WARN monies owed were for back wages that hold priority over other unsecured claims under the Bankruptcy Code.

Good news: structured dismissals have survived Supreme Court scrutiny. Bad news: dismissals may be harder to structure, given yesterday’s 6-2 decision overruling the Third Circuit in Jevic narrowing the context in which they can be approved. We now have guidance on whether or not structured dismissals must follow the Bankruptcy Code’s priority scheme. The short answer is that they must.

On March 22, 2017, the Supreme Court of the United States decided Czyzewski v. Jevic Holding Corp., 580 U.S. __ (2017), holding that a bankruptcy court may not use a structured dismissal of a chapter 11 case to approve a distribution scheme that violates the absolute priority rule. In many middle-market cases, chapter 11 debtors had used this tool to get deals done and reorganize, despite their inability to confirm a chapter 11 plan.

A potential threat to the Code’s priority scheme is the allowance of “structured dismissals,” which include a settlement as part of the dismissal of the chapter 11 case that would distribute estate assets in a manner that contravenes the Code’s priority rules.

On March 22, 2017, the United States Supreme Court held that bankruptcy courts cannot approve a “structured dismissal”—a dismissal with special conditions or that does something other than restoring the “prepetition financial status quo”—providing for distributions that deviate from the Bankruptcy Code’s priority scheme absent the consent of affected creditors. Czyzewski v.Jevic Holding Corp., No. 15-649, 580 U.S. ___ (2017), 2017 WL 1066259, at *3 (Mar. 22, 2017).

On March 22, 2017, the Supreme Court, in Czyzewski et al., v. Jevic Holding Corp., et al., confirmed that the Bankruptcy Code does not permit “priority skipping” in Chapter 11 structured dismissals. In doing so, the Court held that, although the Code does not explicitly provide what, if any, priority rules apply to the distribution of estate assets in a Chapter 11 structured dismissal, “[a] distribution scheme in connection with the dismissal of a Chapter 11 case cannot, without the consent of the affected parties, deviate from the basic priority rules that apply under the . . .