In Slater v. U.S. Steel Corp,[1] the Eleventh Circuit recently revisited its past rulings on judicial estoppel and revamped the standard to be applied when a debtor is pursuing a lawsuit that was not disclosed in bankruptcy.
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Creditors contemplating an objection to discharge proceeding pursuant to Bankruptcy Code § 523(a)(2)(A)’s fraud provision often think that a judgment in a prior state court action will automatically entitle them to judgment in bankruptcy court. Prior to reaching such conclusions, however, creditors should be mindful of several potential pitfalls.
Of all the topics that is sure to incite impassioned disagreement in our current age of partisan disunity, the issue of guns must be near to the top of the list. While some see guns as a uniquely American scourge leaving untold tragedy and carnage in their wake, others view the right to keep and bear arms as the foundation of liberty and the only insurance against tyrannical government.
In April of 2017, the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (CFPB) sued Ocwen Financial Corporation (Ocwen) and its affiliates for supposed systematic deficiencies in their mortgage servicing business.
In all bulk legal practices, there is a concept of a case that is “off the wheel”: a case that cannot be processed through the system in an orderly, cost-effective and efficient manner along with the hundreds of similar cases. Anyone having a bulk practice will tell you that an off-the-wheel case necessarily draws attention to itself; it requires greater overview and inquiry.
The first portion of this article reviewed how a domestic support obligation (DSO) creditor need not shudder if he or she discovers that the DSO debtor has filed a bankruptcy. If a bankruptcy is filed, the DSO creditor knows the debt will not be discharged, the nondischargeable portion of the debt does not require a costly adjudication by adversary, and, if the estate administers assets for the creditors, the DSO creditor will be paid as the first priority. This portion of the article focuses on how Congress has fortified the protections and collections for DSO creditors.
A finding that a particular debt is excepted from a debtor’s discharge is not necessarily the end of the struggles between the debtor and creditor in bankruptcy court.
[1]The meeting of creditors is similar to an open-book exam. The test date is known, the questions are not a secret, and in a twist, the test-taker holds the answer key. It is an opportunity to get a perfect score, but every so often debtor and counsel are not fully prepared, and the issues are usually preventable.