In Re: Leonard
- Lewis Liman
- 1:20-cv-01558
- U.S. District Court · Southern District of New York
- 2
In Re: Leonard: Judge Liman denied Laverne Leonard’s requests to pause the bankruptcy appeals, allowing renewal with supporting reasons.
Laverne Leonard and the appellees in the four related bankruptcy appeals, including HSBC Bank USA, NA.
What happened
In Re: Leonard involves four related appeals from orders of the bankruptcy court in the same underlying matter. The appellees sought to combine two of the appeals, and Laverne Leonard raised concerns about documents filed publicly and the briefing schedule.
The court scheduled a telephone conference to discuss whether the appeals should be combined, address document-filing issues, and set new briefing schedules if needed. The court also considered requests to pause two of the appeals while they were pending.
Judge Liman denied both requests to pause the appeals without prejudice because Laverne Leonard provided no explanation supporting the required factors. The court directed the Clerk of Court to close the two docket entries for those requests.
The detailed version
- In Re: Leonard · No. 1:20-cv-01558
- Lewis Liman
- Oct. 14, 2020
Background
The four related cases are appeals from bankruptcy-court orders in the same underlying action, identified as bankruptcy case No. 19-12337. In case No. 20-cv-1558, the appellees moved to combine that case with No. 20-cv-1518. Laverne Leonard opposed that motion. Leonard also raised issues about filing her brief and supporting exhibits on the public docket in No. 20-cv-1558. Because of those issues, the appellee in that case had not filed a responsive brief.
Conference and briefing
The court ordered a telephone conference for October 22, 2020, at 4 p.m. The court stated that it would address the motion to combine the cases, consider whether all four related cases should be combined, address documents that had not been filed on the public docket, and set new briefing schedules if necessary.
Requests to pause the appeals
Requests to stay, or pause, the bankruptcy-court orders while the appeals proceed were pending in Nos. 20-cv-1558 and 20-cv-1518. The court explained that a stay pending appeal requires consideration of four factors: the likelihood of success on the appeal, irreparable injury without a stay, harm to other interested parties, and the public interest. The person seeking the stay bears the burden of showing that a stay is justified.
Ruling
The court denied both stay motions without prejudice because Laverne Leonard made no showing explaining why a stay was justified under those factors. The order directed the Clerk of Court to close the docket entries for the two stay motions. The order did not decide the pending motion to combine the cases; instead, it set that issue for the scheduled conference. Judge Lewis J. Liman issued the order.
Read the full 2-page opinion on CourtListener, the free public archive maintained by the Free Law Project.