Creditors squabbling over Caesars Entertainment Operating Co.’s $20 billion reorganization asked Bankruptcy Judge Benjamin Goldgar to order them into mediation and to appoint either an active or retired bankruptcy jurist to supervise, but were refused, Bloomberg News reported yesterday. “You don’t need my permission,” Goldgar said yesterday. “Just click your heels together three times and say, ‘There is no place like mediation.’” Mediation is a great idea that is months overdue, Goldgar said. But last month, the local rules that gave federal judges power to order mediation in Northern Illinois were revoked. And there is no other legal authority to justify ordering everybody to sit down and negotiate, Goldgar said. The decision appeared to surprise the dozens of lawyers and other professionals who gathered in Chicago for the hearing. All the major bondholder groups and other lenders, who have been warring since the case was filed more than a year ago, had asked Goldgar for the mediation order. Without court-ordered mediation, creditors who feel left out of the company’s current reorganization proposal will be free to refuse to negotiate.
