From the Editor – Discharge Injunction • NACTT Academy

From the Editor – Discharge Injunction

By The Honorable William Houston Brown (Retired)

Attorney fees recovered by creditor after stay relief not prepetition claim covered by discharge. In a Chapter 7 case, the automatic stay had been lifted to permit state court litigation to continue, and a creditor obtained judgment, including attorney fees. The issue was when those attorney fees arose—prepetition or postpetition for purposes of the debtor’s discharge. The Bankruptcy Appellate Panel construed the test found in In re Ybarra, 424 F.3d 1018 (9th Cir. 2005), concluding that the debtor “returned to the fray” with the . . .

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