Our Practice
Snell & Wilmer’s Bankruptcy, Insolvency and Reorganization team is comprised of some of the West’s leading bankruptcy attorneys. Our clients benefit from the team’s extensive experience representing commercial creditors, debtors, debtors-in-possession, trustees, committees and third parties in all aspects of debt collection, credit relief, debtor-creditor litigation and asset transfers. We work closely with each of our clients to understand their business, their legal issues and their financial challenges, and assist them in developing and implementing an effective strategy to accomplish these objectives. The principal state law services provided by the team include:
- Pre-bankruptcy loan restructuring, workouts and recoveries
- State law foreclosures
- Receiverships
- Judgment enforcement and collections
- Asset sales and liquidations
- State law avoidance actions
- Attachments, injunctions, restraining orders and provisional remedies
The team also represents clients in all aspects of bankruptcy proceedings, including:
- Representing debtors, debtors-in-possession, trustees and committees in Chapter 11 proceedings
- Prosecuting and defending bankruptcy-related causes of action, such as preferences, fraudulent transfers, lien avoidance actions and non-dischargeability claims
- Prosecuting and defending relief from stay motions, cash collateral motions and adequate protection proceedings
- Providing and obtaining debtor-in-possession financing
- Negotiating, objecting to and prosecuting plans of reorganization
- Prosecuting and defending claim objections
- Seeking appointments of trustees and examiners
Our Attorneys
Our nationally recognized insolvency practice consists of eight partners and eleven associates serving clients in Arizona, Utah, California, Nevada and Colorado. In connection with the appropriate local counsel, we also regularly assist clients with needs in other jurisdictions within the United States and around the globe.
Several of our partners have been recognized by their peers in the Best Lawyers in America® (Woodward/White, Inc. of South Carolina), beginning with the 1983 edition of the publication, and seven of the team’s partners are AV rated by Martindale-Hubbell.
Members of the team are frequently asked to speak at legal seminars and industry conferences, and have authored articles in legal and business publications on various bankruptcy and insolvency topics. Our attorneys are actively involved with various local and national insolvency associations; several also hold leadership positions in these organizations.
As a full-service business law firm, Snell & Wilmer’s Bankruptcy, Insolvency and Reorganization team is able to offer clients the benefit of an interdisciplinary approach to problem-solving. As necessary, we draw upon the talents of lawyers who are knowledgeable in related areas such as tax, real estate, corporate law, securities and environmental regulation. This is particularly important because non-bankruptcy issues often become the focus of significant disputes in a Chapter 11 proceeding. Moreover, bankruptcy law intersects with other legal disciplines, including lender liability law, labor and employment law, intellectual property, employee benefits and tax law, securities, business organizations and environmental law. Depending upon the client's needs, the team is capable of pursuing an aggressive litigation approach through the use of commercial litigators, as well as pursuing a consensual or negotiated compromise involving transactional attorneys with experience in sophisticated deal documentation. Working in tandem with attorneys in other practice disciplines allows the Bankruptcy, Insolvency and Reorganization team to provide efficient, cost-effective representation in complex proceedings.
Our Clients
Our Bankruptcy, Insolvency and Reorganization team has represented clients in various industries, including preparation and distribution of food and packaged consumer products; banking, equipment finance and leasing; brokerage; utilities, transportation and telecommunications; farming, ranching and dairy; franchising; pharmaceuticals; heavy machinery and equipment manufacturing; medicine and health care; mining; real estate development, entitlement and construction; asset-based lending; gaming; software development and utilization; insurance; governmental entities, agencies and political subdivisions; and labor unions.
Our Experience
Some of the team’s recent engagements include:
Debtor and Debtor-in-Possession Representations in Bankruptcy
- Successfully reorganizing a national commercial bakery through Chapter 11.
- Successfully representing a Chapter 11 debtor that owned a 552-lot residential real estate development in Coachella, California.
- Reorganizing a national government contractor with over $150 million in annual sales.
- Serving as general bankruptcy counsel to a leading medical software company providing web-based claims and records processing for physicians, helping it to successfully liquidate its business as a going concern within sixty (60) days after filing the case, and then successfully confirming a plan of reorganization to distribute the proceeds of the sale.
Trustee and Committee Representations in Bankruptcy
- Representing the liquidating agent in the Chapter 11 bankruptcy of a national roadway transportation company.
- Serving as counsel to the Chapter 11 trustee of a large dairy farm.
- Counseling a trustee in setting aside the claims and interests of over 1,200 investors in various viatical insurance policies with an aggregate face value exceeding $55 million.
Secured Creditor Representations in Bankruptcy
- Successfully representing creditors by obtaining full payment or return of collateral in Chapter 12 farm reorganizations.
- Assisting the largest secured creditor of a large Chapter 11 regional franchisee in Northern District of Texas.
- Preventing the subordination of a national bank's claim and obtaining a 100% payment on its claim in the bankruptcy of a medical facility.
- Obtaining payment in full of a secured loan, plus a substantial prepayment premium, on behalf of a large financial institution in connection with the sale of commercial property in a Chapter 11 case.
- Conducting forensic due diligence that that uncovered the unauthorized transferee of a client's income-producing collateral and that resulted in satisfaction of the client’s claim, including a yield maintenance premium.
- Uncovering eastern European ghost-loans allegedly secured by a client’s income-producing collateral, which led to payoff of the client’s claims.
Unsecured Creditor Representations in Bankruptcy
- Prosecuting reclamation claims of a large chemical manufacturer, resulting in full payment of the claims.
- Successfully representing commercial landlords in obtaining prompt payment from or eviction of non-paying tenants in bankruptcy.
- Prosecuting reclamation claims of large Arizona manufacturers in the Fleming Foods case in Delaware and the Winn-Dixie Stores case in Florida and successfully defending preference claims in those bankruptcies.
- Assisting a large laminate supplier with a $1.7 million claim in a New York bankruptcy proceeding and in structuring a future business relationship with the debtor.
- Representing insurers in the reorganization of a non-profit religious organization facing sexual harassment suits.
- Negotiating and documenting the purchase of intellectual property rights from the trustee in the Chapter 7 bankruptcy of a financial services company.
- Representing and advising numerous franchisors in Chapter 7 and Chapter 11 bankruptcy cases filed by franchisees and/or their guarantors.
- Serving as counsel for a consortium of municipalities in the Chapter 9 Bankruptcy of Orange County, California.
- Prosecuting claims on behalf of a group of customers who invested in funds that are currently involved in the Refco Brokerage cases, in the Southern District of New York (Refco was the largest commodity brokerage dealer in the United States).
- Serving as counsel to a large food distributor that obtained 100% payment of its $1.1 million general unsecured claim, plus interest and attorneys' fees, from a Chapter 11 debtor and related guarantors.
Miscellaneous Bankruptcy- and Insolvency-Related Matters
- Obtaining summary judgment in favor of a national equipment finance company in defending alleged claims for violations of the automatic stay in which the debtor sought several hundred thousand dollars in damages.
- Obtaining dismissal, with prejudice, in favor of a large paper supplier in an adversary proceeding seeking damages for alleged nonpayment of an open account.
- Obtaining the dismissal of a multi-million dollar lawsuit against a transportation company on the grounds of judicial estoppel because the plaintiff filed a Chapter 7 bankruptcy case and failed to list the lawsuit as an asset.
- Representing a national distributor of vitamins and nutritional supplements in the Chapter 11 bankruptcy of a drug manufacturer and in a related products liability lawsuit which was removed to the District of Colorado.
- Representing a large national bank in conjunction with a Chapter 7 liquidation and fraud investigation.
- Defending a large supplier of electronic equipment and parts in a $1.5 million preference claim by a bankruptcy trustee.
- Counseling a national bank in a combined Arizona Corporation Commission state court receivership and in a multi-debtor bankruptcy ponzi scheme investigation.
- Assisting investors in a privately held company to succeed in the hostile takeover and acquisition of a data hosting center.
Creditor Representations outside of Bankruptcy
- Successfully representing a large financial institution in a wrongful levy action against the United States, resulting in the return of over $2 million.
- Representing secured lenders in workouts and note purchases secured by commercial real property.
- Identifying and seizing $1,000,000 in hidden assets, resulting in successful collection of a client's claim. Obtaining an accounts-freeze order over the assets of a foreign government maintained by a foreign bank with branches located in California.
- Representing the largest equipment supplier and creditor of ASARCO in connection with its $2.3 million claim against ASARCO.
- Successfully defending a large national commercial lender in multi-million dollar lender liability litigation.
- Regularly counseling several lenders and financial institutions in recovered and disposed of real estate collateral.
Debtor Representations Outside of Bankruptcy
- Reversing a $270 million judgment and obtaining the release of a post-judgment garnishment on a $45 million brokerage account for a foreign labor union.
