Scott Storch, the once high-flying producer who churned out hits for Beyonce, Christina Aguilera, Chris Brown and Snoop Dogg filed for chapter 7 protection in Florida earlier this month, the New York Daily News reported today. The 41-year-old, who blew a $70 million fortune on exotic cars, Gulfstream jets, jewelry, real estate and piles of cocaine, valued his debt at nearly $4.4 million and his remaining personal assets at $3,600, the filing obtained by the Daily News stated. He’s now down to $100 in cash, $500 in clothing and a $3,000 watch, he said.
David Cassidy's Fort Lauderdale home is up for auction after a bankruptcy court appointed Fisher Auction Co. to oversee the sale, the South Florida Business Journal reported on Friday. The home has been assessed at $1.9 million and the auction date is tentatively set for Aug. 19. Cassidy, best known for his role in the 1970s sitcom “The Partridge Family,” reported assets and debts each between $1 million and $10 million in his bankruptcy filing.
Though Monica Stitt is unemployed, disabled, and living far below the poverty line, a federal district judge decided last week that she could not cancel more than $37,000 in student debt in bankruptcy, because she hadn’t made a good-faith attempt at repaying the loans, Bloomberg News reported today. Her entire income — about $10,000 per year, according to the judge — consisted of Social Security disability benefits and public assistance. She has been unemployed since 2008.Stitt had borrowed $13,250, which had increased with interest to $37,400 by the time she filed for bankruptcy. After the bankruptcy judge ruled she couldn't shake the debt, the woman appealed to the U.S. District Court in Maryland without a lawyer, where a District judge upheld the bankruptcy court's ruling on June 9. The debtor didn’t meet the “undue hardship” test required by the bankruptcy code, U.S. District Judge Peter J. Messitte said in his opinion. Judge Messitte did his own research and found that she was eligible for two federal loan-consolidation programs in which no payments would be required since her income was so low. After 25 years in the program, the debt would be forgiven even if she had made no payments, as long as her income hadn’t risen. Read more.
Erick Lindgren, a professional poker player who made millions in competitions including the World Series of Poker, filed for bankruptcy protection for the second time in three years, Bloomberg News reported yesterday. The PokerStars online gambling service sued Lindgren after he failed to return a $2 million payment erroneously deposited into his account by its Full Tilt Poker unit. Lindgren also didn’t repay a $531,807 loan, according to papers filed in January in federal court in Nevada. PokerStars in March asked the court to enter a judgment against Lindgren for $2.5 million. Lindgren listed assets of less than $50,000 in chapter 11 papers on Tuesday in bankruptcy court. Creditors without collateral backing their claims are owed more than $8 million. Lindgren’s 2012 bankruptcy was closed without clearing up his debts. At the time, he owed the Internal Revenue Service $3.8 million.
