Business Law Insolvency Law Committee

Local bankruptcy rules permitting the grant of extensions of time to file objections to claimed exemptions and to file nondischargeability complaints contradicted the requirement of showing "cause" under the Federal Rules of Bankruptcy Procedure and, therefore, the local rules were required to be eliminated. Read more

Court awarded attorneys' fees to Chapter 11 debtor which prevailed on a motion to assume a commercial real property lease. Read more

Court denied enforcement of a clause limiting Amazon's liability under its service agreement, ruling that when the agreement was executed damages were not ascertainable and, thus, enforcing the clause would violate public policy. Read more

When a state court defendant has stipulated to facts supporting a state court fraud judgment, those same stipulated facts will support a nondischargeability judgment under Bankruptcy Code section 523(a)(2)(A) based on collateral estoppel. Read more

Trial court abused its discretion in appointing a receiver to aid in collecting a money judgment where there was no evidence showing the judgment debtor was frustrating efforts to collect the judgment. Read more

In Urbina v. Nat’l. Bus. Factors Inc. 979 F.3d 758 (9th Cir. 2020) (“Urbina”), the United States Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit held that a debt collector did not qualify for the bona fide error defense in 15 U.S.C. § 1692k(c) of the Fair Debt Collection Practices Act (“FDCPA”) by contractually obligating its creditor-clients to provide accurate information. Read more

In Lorenzen v. Taggart (In re Taggart), 2020 U.S. App. LEXIS 40787 (9th Cir., Dec. 30, 2020), the United States Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit denied a petition for rehearing of its decision in In re Taggart, 980 F.3d 1340 (9th Cir. 2020) (“Taggart 4”), on remand from the decision of the United States Supreme Court in Taggart v. Lorenzen, 139 S. Ct. 1795 (2019) (“Taggart 3”), which reversed Lorenzen v. Taggart (In re Taggart), 888 F.3d 438 (9th Cir. 2018) (“Taggart 2”). Read more

In Avery v. Leya Techs., LLC (In re Protoype Eng’g & Mfg.), 2020 Bankr. LEXIS 1775 (Bankr. C.D. Cal. 2020) (“Prototype”) (unpublished), the bankruptcy court ruled that a substantive consolidation claim against a non-debtor entity was a “real property claim” within the meaning of California’s lis pendens statute, Cal. Code Civ. Proc. §§ 405.1-405.61. Read more

The Bankruptcy Appellate Panel for the Ninth Circuit remanded in part and reversed in part the decision of the bankruptcy court for the Northern District of California that entered a pre-filing order upon a finding that a chapter 7 debtor was a vexatious litigant. Read more

The U.S. District Court for the District of Idaho affirmed the decision of the bankruptcy court for the District of Idaho finding that a successful creditor in a non-dischargeability proceeding was entitled to an award of attorneys’ fees in prosecuting the action. Read more