Case Summaries
Bankruptcy Law
Criminal Law & Procedure
Bankruptcy Law
[08/27]
Campbell v. Countrywide Home Loans Inc.
In a suit accusing defendant of filing a claim attempting to collect a pre-petition debt in violation of an automatic stay in plaintiffs' Chapter 13 bankruptcy, an interlocutory order granting partial summary judgment for plaintiffs is reversed where: 1) unpaid escrow payments that accumulate pre-petition in the year that a bankruptcy petition is filed, and which the creditor had a right to collect under the loan documents, constitute a "claim" under the Bankruptcy Code; but 2) the filing of a proof of claim including the amounts of these payments does not by itself violate an automatic stay in a bankruptcy proceeding.
[08/26]
In re: Porter
In a bankruptcy case, a ruling excepting from discharge a judgment debt that appellee had obtained against debtor in an employment retaliation case is affirmed where the bankruptcy court correctly bankruptcy court gave collateral estoppel effect to the judgment, and found that the jury in the retaliation case necessarily found that debtor willfully and maliciously injured appellee.
[08/26]
In re: Hamilton
11 U.S.C. section 524(a) makes a state-court judgment void ab initio when entered against a debtor whose dischargeable debts have been discharged.
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Criminal Law & Procedure
[08/28]
People v. Cross
Sentence for committing a lewd act on a child under the age of 14, and enhancement of that sentence for a finding of great bodily injury, is affirmed where: 1) a pregnancy without medical complications resulting from unlawful but nonforcible intercourse can support a finding of great bodily injury; and 2) jury instructions on whether abortion may constitute great bodily injury were inapplicable given that defendant did not personally perform an abortion on the victim, but defendant was not prejudiced by the instructions.
[08/28]
People v. Lindberg
In a death penalty case, conviction and sentence are affirmed on automatic appeal over claims of error regarding: 1) evidence admitted at trial regarding prior uncharged crimes; 2) sufficiency of the evidence of first degree felony murder and the robbery special circumstance; 3) a jury instruction on evidence of other crimes; 4) sufficiency of evidence of the hate-murder special circumstance; 5) prejudice caused by expert evidence regarding white supremacy; 6) the constitutionality of jury instructions on the death penalty; 7) the court's failure to clarify the meaning of "life without the possibility of parole"; 8) the constitutionality of the death penalty statute; and 9) cumulative error.
[08/28]
US v. Stein
Dismissal of indictment of thirteen former partners of the accounting firm KPMG for creating fraudulent tax shelters is affirmed where: 1) the government deprived defendants of their right to counsel under the Sixth Amendment by causing KPMG to place conditions on the advancement of legal fees to defendants, and to cap the fees and ultimately end them; 2) the government failed to cure the Sixth Amendment violation; and 3) no other remedy will return defendants to the status quo ante.
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