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Bankruptcy & Creditors' Rights

CSG Law combines creativity and business acumen with practicality, devising solutions to meet our clients’ specific needs and accomplish their goals in complex bankruptcies, out-of-court workouts and restructurings across the nation.

Exceptional Perspective

Our Bankruptcy & Creditors’ Rights Group brings together a team of the region’s most experienced and respected bankruptcy lawyers, powerhouse trial lawyers, and skilled mediators. We stand out as one of very few firms equally adept in aggressively pursuing our clients’ interests in court and crafting out-of-court solutions through mediation and other forms of dispute resolution.

Experienced in representing many stakeholders in the insolvency arena, from secured creditors to landlords, sureties, trustees, and debtors, we bring a 360-degree perspective and nuanced understanding of each one’s concerns. This ensures the knowledge required to resolve even the most complicated challenges to position our clients for success.

Experienced Across Issues and Industries

Collaborating with our clients and CSG Law attorneys in real estate, environmental law, corporate law, finance, intellectual property rights, litigation, tax and other practice areas, we have readily available legal capabilities to address our clients’ complex and multifaceted legal and business realities. For example, ours is one of just a few firms nationally that combines bankruptcy experience with proficiency in representing surety bond companies in complex Chapter 11 cases, including those involving oil and gas, coal mining, healthcare and retail sectors.

Bankruptcy & Creditors’ Rights Litigation

We excel in the fast-paced, high-stakes, and multiple-party bankruptcy arena. With experience, deep legal knowledge and strategic approaches to complex problem-solving, we consistently secure favorable outcomes. From pre-bankruptcy counseling of creditors or debtors to addressing the emergent motions of a nascent bankruptcy filing, to seeking recoveries from non-debtor third parties and affiliates, including fraudsters and cheats, our lawyers go the distance.

Distressed Assets

With ever-increasing frequency, sophisticated clients are demanding legal counsel swiftly and economically turn distressed assets into tangible recoveries. Our lawyers have engaged in beginning-to-end Section 363 auctions to sell or purchase distressed assets, and have resolved efficiently complicated, multi-transaction-related issues that often arise when unwinding a complex corporate structure. We have helped clients manage intercompany obligations, as well as labor, employment, pension, IP and tax issues when merging, acquiring or selling a distressed company in or outside of bankruptcy.

Alternatives to Bankruptcy

Clients also rely on CSG Law to guide them through alternatives to bankruptcy including foreclosures, receiverships, and assignments for the benefit of creditors (ABCs). We often consider using a UCC Article 9 sale to monetize secured collateral quickly and efficiently. When a fraudulent transfer or dissipation of assets or collateral is suspected, we vigorously pursue temporary restraints, injunctions and other prejudgment actions. We have achieved winning results in actions seeking attachment, replevin, appointment of receivers in complex foreclosures, and injunctive relief to preserve assets and maintain the status quo before a bankruptcy or an ABC.

Representative Matters:

  • Represented a prominent NY Metropolitan Area land developer in Federal litigation and a subsequent bankruptcy filing to evict a holdover tenant preventing the development project from going forward. In less than a year, and after a mediation session in bankruptcy, CSG Law proposed and confirmed a unique “creditors’” plan of reorganization, adopted by the debtor/tenant, in the U.S. Bankruptcy Court for the Eastern District of New York. The creditors’ plan provided for the payment of unsecured claims in full, a substantial multimillion-dollar cash payment to the sole secured creditor and the relocation of the debtor/tenant’s operations to allow unfettered development of the property.
  • Represented a national credit card processor, in the Bankruptcy Court for the Eastern District of Michigan, in its efforts to recover millions of dollars in allegedly fraudulent chargebacks against credit cards processed by a mid-west furniture retailer prior to its bankruptcy filing. The representation involves pursuit of the debtor’s principal and his affiliated companies for recovery of various million-dollar fraudulent transfers, as well as a federal arbitration proceeding against a former officer for his alleged role in the fraud.
  • Represented a national bank against a defaulted borrower and his affiliated automobile dealerships in NY and NJ in obtaining prejudgment writs of attachment against real and personal property for alleged fraudulent activity, subsequently selling millions of dollars of automobile inventory through a unique use of a UCC Article 9 auction sale, and obtaining a substantial non-dischargeable judgment grounded in fraud against the principal of the borrower in his personal bankruptcy.
  • Helped advise an official committee of unsecured creditors in negotiating a consensual chapter 11 plan addressing more than $600 million in filed claims.
  • Successfully litigated a $1.75 million claim challenge brought by an SEC receiver against an investor client in federal securities litigation.
  • Successfully mediated to settlement dozens of adversary proceedings brought in bankruptcy cases, including for alleged avoidable transfers, non-dischargeable debts, and violations of federal banking regulations.
  • Negotiated an out-of-court debt restructuring of a private loan on behalf of a small, local, long-standing family business at risk of closure.
  • Represented a large national wholesale pharmaceutical distributor in a chapter 11 case involving hundreds of millions of dollars, in which our client filed numerous claims for contractual, statutory, and common law rights of indemnity, contribution, reimbursement, recoupment, setoff and other liabilities. Ultimately, we achieved a broad global resolution of all issues resulting in the confirmation of a chapter 11 plan of reorganization.
  • Represented a large surety bond provider in a chapter 11 case filed by a coal mining company; under the debtors’ chapter 11 plan, all assets were transferred to a reclamation trust entity responsible for reclaiming (remediating) a number of coal mines owned by debtors in the Midwest, in accordance with a reclamation plan agreed to by the debtors, their secured lenders, and several sureties (including our client), and for which all applicable regulatory and/or third-party approvals were sought and obtained. We represented the client in negotiating and executing a go-forward bonding agreement, a reclamation trust agreement, a sinking fund agreement, and numerous ancillary documents and agreements.
  • Assisted our client, who was appointed as healthcare receiver for a troubled nursing home and behavioral center facility, pursuant to a never before applied New Jersey statute in accomplishing his court-ordered obligation to protect and maintain the health and welfare of the more than 350 residents, and to relocate and transfer all those residents to appropriate alternative facilities safely and promptly. The firm’s team navigated a broad range of legal and regulatory matters, including those involving healthcare law, secured financing, labor and employment law, and insurance law.
 
Sam  Della Fera, Jr.

Sam Della Fera, Jr.

Member
Co-Chair, Bankruptcy & Creditors' Rights Group
Phone (973) 530-2076sdellafera@csglaw.com

Robert E. Nies

Robert E. Nies

Member
Chair, Bankruptcy & Creditors' Rights Group
Phone (973) 530-2012Fax (973) 530-2212rnies@csglaw.com

Armen  Shahinian

Armen Shahinian

Member
Member, Executive Committee
Chair, Fidelity & Surety Group
Phone (973) 530-2002NY Phone (212) 973-0572ashahinian@csglaw.com

Scott A. Zuber

Scott A. Zuber

Member
Practice Group Leader, Bankruptcy & Creditors' Rights Group
Phone (973) 530-2046Fax (973) 530-2246szuber@csglaw.com