Recent Tenth Circuit Decision in John Q Hammons Fall Following SCOTUS’ Decision in Siegel v. Fitzgerald Could Result in Significant Refunds for Certain Chapter 11 Debtors
The Constitutionality of Increased Trustee Fees In Bankruptcy
The United States Supreme Court has held that the sovereign immunity waiver in Section 106(a) of the Bankruptcy Code does not extend to state law claims “nested” within a Section 544(b) claim for relief, depriving bankruptcy...more
Bankruptcy trustees and chapter 11 debtors-in-possession ("DIPs") frequently seek to avoid fraudulent transfers and obligations under section 544(b) of the Bankruptcy Code and state fraudulent transfer or other applicable...more
The Supreme Court recently issued an opinion, resolving a circuit split, narrowing the sovereign immunity exception by limiting a trustee’s ability to pursue avoidance actions against the government when such action invokes...more
Section 106(a) Doesn’t Waive Sovereign Immunity for State-Law-Based Section 544(b) Claims - The U.S. Supreme Court has significantly curtailed bankruptcy trustees’ powers in United States v. Miller, 145 S. Ct. 839 (2025). In...more
The Bankruptcy Code provides chapter 7 trustees with significant powers to liquidate and collect estate assets and pursue litigation claims, such as fraudulent transfer claims against third parties, all to increase the...more
On March 26, 2025, the United States Supreme Court decided United States v. Miller, No. 23-824, resolving a circuit split and holding that in an action brought under § 544(b) of the bankruptcy code, § 106(a)’s sovereign...more
This author previously wrote an article published in Bloomberg Law regarding the Supreme Court’s decision to take up an appeal of a decision on the Tenth Circuit Court of Appeals in United States v. Miller. In Miller, the...more
In one of the most publicized terms for the U.S. Supreme Court, one June decision has not received the attention it deserves: Truck Insurance Exchange v. Kaiser Gypsum Company Inc. Truck upends decades of Chapter 11...more
It has been approximately two months since the highly anticipated Supreme Court decision in Harrington v. Purdue Pharma L.P., and it is already making a significant impact in bankruptcies around the country. In September...more
As previously discussed and anticipated in prior blog posts, the United States Supreme Court’s decision in Siegel v. Fitzgerald, 596 U.S. 464, 142 S.Ct. 1770, 213 L.Ed.2d 39 (2022), which struck down as unconstitutional the...more
The United States Trustee Program is responsible for the efficient administration of bankruptcy cases throughout most of the country. Since 1986, the Trustee Program has covered all states except North Carolina and Alabama,...more
We have blogged a few times about the Supreme Court’s decision in Siegel v. Fitzgerald and its implications. In Siegel, the Supreme Court invalidated the disparity in debtor-paid fees prevailing in most of 2018 between the 88...more
The Fox Rothschild In Solvency blog previously covered the Supreme Court’s decision in Siegel v. Fitzgerald, 142 S. Ct. 1770 (2022), in which the 2017 amendment to 28 U.S.C. § 1930(a)(6) increasing quarterly fees payable to...more
We have previously blogged about Siegel v. Fitzgerald, the Supreme Court decision last June that invalidated the 2018 difference in fees between bankruptcy cases filed in Bankruptcy Administrator judicial districts and U.S....more
In this episode of the Lowenstein Bankruptcy Lowdown, Michael Savetsky and Erica G. Mannix discuss the recent Tenth Circuit decision in In re John Q Hammons Fall 2006 LLC determining the appropriate remedy for a debtor’s...more
On June 6, 2022, the Supreme Court issued a unanimously ruling in Siegel v. Fitzgerald, 142 S. Ct. 1770 (U.S. June 6, 2022) that the increase in fees payable to the U.S. Trustee system in 2018 violated the uniformity aspect...more
We have previously written about Siegel v. Fitzgerald, No. 21-441, the Supreme Court case considering the question of whether the 2018 difference in fees between Bankruptcy Administrator judicial districts and U.S. Trustee...more
Earlier this year, we highlighted the US Supreme Court’s grant of certiorari in Siegel v. Fitzgerald (In re Circuit City Stores, Inc.) to determine whether a 2017 statute that increased Chapter 11 quarterly fees was...more
Today, Lowenstein's Michael Savetsky and Erica G. Mannix discuss the U.S. Supreme Court’s unanimous decision in Siegel v. Fitzgerald, which held that the statutory amendment that increased the fees a Chapter 11 debtor pay...more
In a long-anticipated decision, on June 6, 2022, the Supreme Court unanimously struck down a 2017 increase in U.S. Trustee fees as unconstitutional. The Court held that the increase was a violation of the Constitution’s...more
Southwest Airlines v. Saxon, No. 21-309: This case concerns the scope of the Federal Arbitration Act’s (FAA) exemption for certain interstate transportation workers - namely, “seamen, railroad employees, or any other class of...more
This Term, the U.S. Supreme Court accepted certiorari in Siegel v. Fitzgerald (In re Circuit City Stores, Inc.), 996 F.3d 156 (4th Cir. 2021), cert. granted, No. 21-441 (U.S. Jan. 10, 2022), in order to resolve the growing...more
The US Supreme Court tends to hear a couple of bankruptcy cases per term. Most of these cases deal with interpreting provisions of the Bankruptcy Code. However, every few years or so, the Supreme Court decides a...more
Alfred Siegel v. John Fitzgerald, III, No. 21-441: This case, involving the Bankruptcy Judgeship Act of 2017 (“BJA”) applicable to Chapter 11 bankruptcies, presents the following question: Whether the BJA violates the...more