John D. Schwartz
How Judge Schwartz rules, drawn from 20 signed orders. Every observation links to the order it came from.
Judge Schwartz no longer hears cases. This profile is preserved as a historical record of how they ruled.
How Judge Schwartz decides
Patterns drawn from this judge's own signed orders. Every observation links to the order it came from.
What persuades
A late-claim creditor with actual knowledge of a bankruptcy was expected to monitor the docket for a bar date, particularly when the claim was large and the creditor had already requested notice.
“by July, a corporate party with a $1.1 million claim in a bankruptcy case of which it has actual knowledge should be checking the docket for a bar date.”
An ordinary-course preference defense required evidence of the parties' actual dealings and the range of acceptable industry practices; an unsupported affidavit and an invoice marked past due did not carry that burden.
“Simply put, PTI supplied no evidence of the range of acceptable practices in its industry at all and failed to sustain its burden of proof.”
Procedural preferences
The court would retroactively annul the stay where defective notice left a creditor unaware of the case, the creditor otherwise held a valid setoff right, and the debtor suffered no harm.
“The court finds that the IRS is entitled to setoff, and this matter warrants the retroactive annulment of the stay”
Long-known property disputes had to be brought promptly; waiting until a large case was winding down after years of notice supported dismissal on timeliness grounds.
“CIT failed to bring its causes of action in a timely manner. Therefore, the complaint will be dismissed in its entirety.”
Cautions
A fraud-based nondischargeability plaintiff still had to show justifiable reliance; a promised 2,080 percent one-year return was too implausible to support reliance without any investigation.
“this court can come to only one conclusion, that as a college-educated person Krist was not justified in relying on representations of Curtis that he would earn a 2080% profit on his money in one year.”
Signed rulings
A grounded sample of orders signed by this judge, with the verbatim dispositive language.
“NOW THEREFORE IT IS ORDERED that the Chapter 11 case of the debtor, CLDC Management Corp. be, and the same hereby is dismissed.”
“NOW THEREFORE, IT IS ORDERED that the Illinois Homestead Exemption may be claimed by Harold Reuter in and to the Property and the Trustee’s motion to disallow same is denied.”
“NOW THEREFORE IT IS ORDERED that the motion of the Beninato Brothers to terminate adequate protection payment to the Main Bank is hereby denied.”
“NOW THEREFORE IT IS ORDERED that the Debtor’s motion to avoid Associates’ lien on ‘Mise. Auto repair Equipment’ belonging to the Debtors’ is hereby granted.”
“NOW THEREFORE, IT IS ORDERED that the Creditors Committee’s Motion to Convert this Case to one under Chapter 7 is hereby denied without prejudice to its renewal.”
The court held that the debtors did not timely perform an executory real-estate contract and ordered the earnest-money escrow returned to the purchasers.
“NOW THEREFORE IT IS ORDERED, that debtor’s motion for turnover is denied and the Illinois State Scholarship Commission’s motion to modify the stay in order to apply debtor’s income tax refund to her student loan liability is granted.”
“For the reasons articulated above, Plaintiffs’ Motion for Summary Judgment is denied.”
“For the reasons stated above, judgment will be entered in favor of the Defendant.”
“The motion to annul the automatic stay to fund the trust must be denied.”
“For the reasons set forth above, the motion to allow an informal proof of claim or leave to amend the claim is denied.”
“For the foregoing reasons, Nuthi’s motion to dismiss will be denied.”
A historical record
Judge Schwartz no longer hears cases. This profile stays available as a record of how they ruled. If you're preparing for a matter, start from the court's current bench.