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Caesars Entertainment Operating Co. wants to extend until Nov. 15 the amount of time it has to file its own reorganization proposal without the threat of rival plans, the Wall Street Journal reported today. Caesars on Wednesday requested until Jan. 15, 2016, to solicit votes on any proposal it files. Without an approval from Bankruptcy Judge A. Benjamin Goldgar, Caesars’ exclusive period to file a plan would run out May 15, and the time to solicit votes on such a proposal would run out July 14.

The Roman Catholic Archdiocese of St. Paul and Minneapolis won a federal judge's approval yesterday to impose an Aug. 3 deadline for alleged sexual-abuse victims to come forward with claims despite objections from victims' lawyers, Dow Jones Daily Bankruptcy Review reported today. Bankruptcy Judge Robert Kressel said that the August deadline, by which victims must file formal claims for compensation or potentially face challenges from the archdiocese, was not absolute and that claims could still be filed at any time. "This time period can be extended," he said. "That may or may not happen, but it is available."

The energy arm of private equity giant Blackstone Group LP is objecting to Optim Energy LLC’s plan to exit bankruptcy through the sale of its two Texas power plants that it says is designed to benefit only Bill Gates’s private investment firm, the Wall Street Journal reported today. Optim is controlled by the Microsoft co-founder’s Cascade Investment, which has been funding the company’s operations and is backing the chapter 11 plan based on the power plant sales. Lawyers for Walnut Creek Mining, a subsidiary of Blackstone Energy Partners, say that the proposed sale been designed “by and for the benefit of Cascade and Cascade only” and that Optim’s plan shouldn’t win court confirmation. “Congress did not design chapter 11 as a one-way street for the sole lender/equity owner to get all sorts of benefits, including releases, at the effective expense of one creditor,” Walnut Creek’s lawyers said in bankruptcy court papers filed on Wednesday.

General Motors Co. car owners will still seek $7.5 billion for the diminished value of recalled vehicles, despite a ruling that largely freed the automaker from liability for wrongdoing before its 2009 bankruptcy, Bloomberg News reported today. That number was supplied by a lawyer for car owners the day after Bankruptcy Judge Robert Gerber upheld GM’s shield against claims tied to actions taken before its bailout. The attorney, Steve Berman, said that 10 million is a conservative estimate of the number of drivers still eligible to sue for about $750 each after Wednesday’s decision. The litigation stems from last year’s recall of cars for faulty ignition switches, which grew to cover GM vehicles for a number of flaws. The owners can pursue “claims for economic loss caused by New GM’s misconduct in covering up the ignition switch defects and scores of other known defects,” plus damages, Berman said. GM escaped billions more in liability because Judge Gerber also ruled that the company can’t be sued for economic losses tied to so-called Old GM’s actions or over accidents that happened before the bailout. http://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2015-04-17/gm-car-owners-to-fight-on-for-billions-after-bankruptcy-ruling

For more on litigation and liquidation trusts in bankruptcy, be sure to pick up ABI’s A Practitioner's Guide to Liquidation and Litigation Trusts. 

Plethico Pharmaceuticals Ltd., which has twice been accused of fraud in connection with a natural products company it sold in bankruptcy, may have once again negotiated its way out of legal trouble, the Wall Street Journal reported today. The latest accusations come from India’s Aurobindo Pharma, which told stock exchange regulators it’s agreed to accept $23.3 million from Plethico. The transaction would settle the fraud action Aurobindo initiated last week in the bankruptcy court that is overseeing the process of paying off the debts of Natrol, a company Plethico sold to Aurobindo at a chapter 11 sale. Aurobindo paid $132.5 million for Natrol, a thriving supplier of vitamins and supplements to major retailers. According to Aurobindo, $25 million worth of construction that was supposed to be going on at Natrol was allegedly a ruse to move money into Plethico’s pocket. Plethico placed Natrol into bankruptcy protection in June 2014 to get breathing room to deal with Cerberus Capital Group, Natrol’s lead secured lender, which voiced similar suspicions about the construction deal last year and demanded its loans be repaid.

The court-appointed official tracking down money for Bernard Madoff's cheated investors wants to return $1.25 billion to customers who fell victim to the biggest Ponzi scheme ever, Dow Jones Daily Bankruptcy Review reported today. Irving Picard, the trustee in charge of returning cash to Madoff's victims, is seeking court approval to make his sixth distribution to customers more than six years after Madoff's multibillion-dollar Ponzi scheme collapsed. In a filing Wednesday with the U.S. Bankruptcy Court in Manhattan, Picard is seeking the release of most of the $1.45 billion that was held in reserve as part of the ongoing litigation with Madoff's early victims who had been seeking "time-based damages," that is inflation or interest adjustments on their claimed losses. An appellate court rejected the time-based claims in February.

A bankruptcy judge ruled yesterday that General Motors Co. will not have to face dozens of lawsuits accusing it of concealing an ignition-switch defect that led to the recall of 2.6 million vehicles, Reuters reported yesterday. GM had argued that it was protected from claims on vehicles pre-dating its 2009 exit from chapter 11 bankruptcy, while plaintiffs in the lawsuits said the company violated their constitutional rights by failing to disclose the defect. The decision by Bankruptcy Judge Robert Gerber means GM may avoid potentially billions of dollars in liability, as well as the cost of defending those lawsuits, although claims arising from GM's conduct after its bankruptcy will not be affected. The plaintiffs will have to file their claims against the financially strapped "Old GM," the shell company comprised of bad assets GM shed in bankruptcy. As of October, Old GM's main assets were worth about $9.25 billion, versus roughly $32 billion in claims, a recovery of about 29 cents on the dollar for trust creditors. Judge Gerber held that GM economic-loss plaintiffs can still bring claims against New GM based solely on its post-bankruptcy conduct.

Energy Future Holdings Corp. and its warring creditor groups expressed optimism about a new round of talks over an $11 billion proposal to reorganize the company so it can exit bankruptcy by year’s end, Bloomberg News reported yesterday. Company officials “believe the time is right to begin a determined march” to end the $42 billion chapter 11 case, attorney Edward Sassower told a bankruptcy judge at a hearing yesterday. Some creditors of Dallas-based Energy Future have proposed raising $11 billion in debt and equity, a lawyer for a group of lower-ranking debt holders told the judge. A deal could be two months off, should everybody involved in the latest negotiations stick with their current positions, said the attorney, Chris Shore, who represents a group of creditors that has fought the company since the bankruptcy began 11 months ago.

The latest salvo in Standard Register Co.’s bankruptcy case was fired by Greenwich, Conn.-based hedge fund Silver Point — which agreed to a $275 million purchase of the Dayton-based company — against the unsecured creditors’ committee in the case, the Dayton (Ohio) Business Journal reported yesterday. In a court filing late last week, Silver Point says that the committee unfairly maligned it by putting out a conspiracy theory that manipulative transactions led to Standard Register's financial troubles without any substantial evidence and without offering any constructive alternatives. Silver Point also says that the committee ignored evidence showing that Standard Register pursued another potential bidder for the stalking-horse position, with Silver Point’s support. Standard Register provides document management as well as business and marketing communication products and services.