Case Updates

A mortgagee could use its standing under a Nevada quiet title statute to invalidate a condominium association foreclosure sale that wiped out the mortgagee's junior lien because the sale violated the automatic stay in the borrower's bankruptcy. Read more

Under the Hawaii evidence code, a promissory note is not hearsay but a duplicate of a promissory note is not self-authenticating commercial paper. Read more

Interpreting Ohio’s versions of two uniform acts, the Uniform Commercial Code (UCC) and the Uniform Fraudulent Transfer Act (UFTA), the Sixth Circuit Court of Appeals (the “Court”) ruled that an involuntary debtor’s payments to a lender under the parties’ revolving loan agreement were encumbered by a “valid lien” created by the lender’s perfected security interest and as such were not “transfers” which could be avoided by a bankruptcy trustee despite debtor’s participation in a Ponzi scheme and the lender’s alleged bad faith acts after learning of the scheme. Read more

A creditor's failure to include the debtor's middle name in its financing statement was strong indication under Georgia law that the liens were invalid and could not be used to support a stay relief motion in a chapter 12 case. Read more

Court clarified what actions by a trustee are required in order for a chapter 7 debtor to lose his homestead exemption on recovered property under Bankruptcy Code section 522(g). Read more

An inherited 401(k) account is not property of the estate and not subject to turnover by the debtor to a chapter 7 trustee. Read more

Letter from a debt collector extending an offer to settle a credit card debt in full that failed to inform the consumer about potential accruing interest and fees was not a violation of the FDCPA. Read more

Automatic stay in a bankruptcy proceeding did not prevent a judgment creditor from renewing a judgment while the case was pending, but Bankruptcy Rule 108(c) extended the time to renew until 30 days after the stay was terminated. Read more

In appropriate circumstances, reverse veil piercing is an available remedy for a judgment creditor who could not collect directly from the judgment debtor. Read more

Court dismissed chapter 7 trustee's constructive fraudulent conveyance claim against defendant electrical company and rejected trustee's theory that defendant failed to provide services to a property owned by a third party with whom debtor had contracted to manage a portfolio of properties that included the subject property. Read more