Erithe A. Smith

How Judge Smith rules, drawn from 2 signed orders. Every observation links to the order it came from.

Court
U.S. Bankruptcy Court for the Central District of California
Position
bankruptcy
Status
Recalled to service
Appointed by
U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit
Commissioned
1994-05-02
Education
Loyola Marymount University, B.A., cum laude, 1979; University of California, Berkeley, Boalt Hall School of Law, J.D., 1982
Signed orders read
2

How Judge Smith decides

Patterns drawn from this judge's own signed orders. Every observation links to the order it came from.

What persuades

A disqualification request requires evidence rather than speculation about how a judge might participate in separate litigation.

“speculation by a non-party to a lawsuit as to the possible future litigation strategy of a plaintiff cannot establish partiality or bias”

A party seeking recusal should move promptly after learning the asserted basis; an unexplained eight-month delay weighed against the request.

“Debtor waited eight months to submit the Motion.”

Procedural preferences

Remote participants should connect at least ten minutes before the hearing so check-in and display-name issues can be resolved.

“Dial in or connect at least 10 minutes prior to you hearing start time”

A participant should state their name when first speaking and again after another speaker to preserve a clear audio record.

“When you first speak—and each time you speak after someone else has spoken—please say your name.”

Cautions

A party choosing remote participation bears the practical risk of a malfunction or disconnection.

“any party or counsel that elects to appear remotely bears the risk of malfunction or disconnection from the hearing”

Signed rulings

A grounded sample of orders signed by this judge, with the verbatim dispositive language.

In re Anh Minh Nguyen and Quyen To Lieu
8:16-bk-12496 · 2016-09-27
Motion to avoid judicial lien (debtors Anh Minh Nguyen and Quyen To Lieu) Granted

“Motion granted:”

In re Thelma V. Spirtos
LA 84-13757 AA · 2003-08-27
Motion to disqualify bankruptcy judge (debtor Thelma V. Spirtos) Denied

“the Motion to Disqualify Hon. Alan Ahart, U.S. Bankruptcy Judge is denied”

Caseload & timing

From public federal docket records for this judge.

The ten terminated sampled matters lasted 54 to 1,347 days, with a median of 829 days. No pending matter was returned by the exact-name searches. This fixed sample is descriptive and is not a complete caseload census.

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