Compensation of debtor's counsel in consumer cases was the focus of the Consumer Committee meeting held on April 16, 2004, at the Annual Spring Meeting in Washington, D.C., and attended by approximately 50 members. The program featured a panel discussion led by the Honorable Jennie Latta of the Western District of Tennessee, Diane Livingstone, an Assistant United States Trustee from Region 7 and Marjorie Payne Britt, a bankruptcy practitioner in Houston, Texas. Topics included recent holdings by the United States Supreme Court in Lamie v. United States Trustee and the Seventh Circuit's decision in Bethea v. Adams & Associates and their implications for debtor's counsel and the provision of legal services to debtors in chapter 7 cases.
Judge Latta prepared an analysis of these decisions and their impact, which is included in the 2004 Annual Spring Meeting conference educational materials. In addition, articles on both cases appear in the first edition of the Consumer Committee's electronic newsletter on the ABI web site. Additional topics included the status of limited representation and unbundling of legal services as reflected in revisions to various state codes of ethics and professional responsibility and decisions of both state and federal courts. Also discussed were the varying approaches taken to compensation of debtor's counsel in chapter 13 cases across the country, including the concept of a presumptive or a "no look-at" fee available to counsel in some jurisdictions and the requirements for earning that fee. These latter two topics are discussed in detail in a comprehensive outline prepared by the Honorable David Kennedy of the Western District of Tennessee and included in the conference materials. A reprint of Tom Yerbich’s article on limited representation appearing in a recent edition of the ABI Journal was also made available to those who attended the meeting.
Reprinted with permission of Norton Bankruptcy Law Advisor