2003

The focus of a chapter 13 filing is found in §1321, with its simple dictate: "The debtor shall file a plan." The debtor's goal in such a plan is to resolve as many issues as possible with the plan and confirmation. While there are limitations on what may be included

Several years ago, this column addressed the then-growing tendency of bankruptcy courts to enter "first-day orders" allowing debtors to make post-petition payments on account of pre-petition unsecured employee wage claims over and above the priority limit established in

Editor's Note: This is the third in this column series for the newly minted chapter 11 professional. In our last installment, we began to paint a portrait of a chapter 11 debtor's life, from preparing for a bankruptcy filing to first-day hearings, the effect of the

Actions on the eve of bankruptcy will many times determine the availability of the fresh start: a new financial life free of debt with some exempt assets. Debtors push the envelope on exemption planning because the legislative history of the Bankruptcy Code emphasizes

Consumer creditors were dealt a favorable hand on the issue of lien "revival" or "revesting" in a recent decision authored by Judge Eugene R. Wedoff in In re Booth. 1 The issue presented in Booth is the effect of dismissal of a chapter 13 case in which the secured

As H.R. 975, the "Bankruptcy Abuse Prevention and Consumer Protection Act of 2003" (the Act), inches toward almost inevitable enactment, two questions are on the minds of many bankruptcy professionals. First, why single out consumer debtors and not all individuals for