### In the



# United States Court of Appeals

For the Seventh Circuit

____________________

No. 17

‐ 1615

E STATE OF S OAD W ATTAR

, et al

., Intervenors

‐ Appellants

,

v.

H ORACE F OX

, J R

.,

Trustee

‐ Appellee.

____________________

Appeal from the United States District Court for the

Northern District of Illinois, Eastern Division.

No. 16

‐ cv

‐ 4699

— Robert M. Dow, Jr.

, Judge

.

____________________

No. 18

‐ 2197

I N RE : R ICHARD S HARIF

. Debtor

, A PPEAL OF : M AURICE S ALEM

____________________

Appeal from the United States District Court for the

Northern District of Illinois, Eastern Division.

No. 17

‐ cv

‐ 1500

— Robert M. Dow, Jr.

, Judge

.

____________________2 Nos. 17

‐ 1615, 18

‐ 2197 & 22

‐ 2826

No. 22

‐ 2826

H AIFA S HARIFEH

, Intervenor

‐ Appellant

,

v.

H ORACE F OX

, J R

.,

Trustee

‐ Appellee.

____________________

Appeal from the United States District Court for the

Northern District of Illinois, Eastern Division.

No. 18

‐ cv

‐ 8508

— Martha M. Pacold

, Judge

.

____________________

S UBMITTED A PRIL 13, 2023 *

— D ECIDED A PRIL 21, 2023

R E

‐ I SSUED J UNE 16, 2023 †

____________________ Before E ASTERBROOK

, W OOD

, and K IRSCH

, Circuit Judges

.

P ER C URIAM

. In 2010, the United States Bankruptcy Court

for the Northern District of Illinois ruled that all assets held

by the Soad Wattar Revocable Living Trust—including the

Wattar family home—were part of the bankruptcy estate of

* We have agreed to decide each of the three cases discussed in this

opinion without oral argument, because the briefs and the record ade

‐ quately present the facts and legal arguments, and thus oral argument

would not significantly aid the court. F ED

. R. A PP

. P. 34(a)(2)(C).

† An earlier version of this opinion was originally issued as a nonprec

‐

edential order. Upon request of the bankruptcy judges of the Northern

District of Illinois, the court has decided to revise and re

‐ issue it as a for

‐

mal opinion.Nos. 17

‐ 1615, 18

‐ 2197 & 22

‐ 2826 3

Richard Sharif. Sharif was the son of Soad Wattar, now de

‐

ceased. As the sole trustee of the Wattar trust, Sharif had full

control of its assets. Sharif’s sisters, Haifa and Ragda Sharifeh,

soon launched an effort to keep the trust proceeds out of their

brother’s bankruptcy estate; their strategy was to show that it

was they who owned the trust assets, not their brother.

At issue in these appeals are the bankruptcy court’s rul

‐ ings on three motions: (1) Haifa’s 2015 motion to vacate the

court’s decision that all trust assets belonged to the bank

‐

ruptcy estate; (2) the sisters’ joint 2016 motion for leave to sue

the Chapter 7 trustee assigned to Sharif’s bankruptcy for pur

‐ ported due

‐ process violations; and (3) Ragda’s 2016 motion

seeking both reimbursement of money she allegedly spent on

the family home and the proceeds from Wattar’s life insur

‐

ance policy, which the court had found to be an asset of the

trust and therefore part of the bankruptcy estate. The bank

‐

ruptcy court denied all three motions and sanctioned the sis

‐

ters and their lawyer, Maurice Salem

. Each ruling was af

‐

firmed on appeal to the district court. We are no more per

‐

suaded by the appellants’ arguments (to the extent they de

‐ velop any) than were the judges who already rejected them,

and so we affirm.

I

Sharif filed for Chapter 7 bankruptcy in 2009. His mother,

Soad Wattar, had established a living trust, of which he was

the sole trustee. (His sisters would later argue that a 2007 trust

amendment had made Ragda the sole trustee, but that led no

‐ where.) When Wattar died in March 2010, Sharif produced a

will that named him executor of her estate and provided for

all Wattar’s assets to pass into the trust. In June 2010, in a cred

‐

itor’s adversary proceeding against Sharif, the bankruptcy4 Nos. 17

‐ 1615, 18

‐ 2197 & 22

‐ 2826

court ruled that the trust’s assets were part of the bankruptcy

estate because Sharif had sole control over them and treated

them as if they were his personal property. On the motion of

the Chapter 7 bankruptcy trustee, Horace Fox, the bankruptcy

court then ordered the trust assets to be turned over to the

bankruptcy estate. (The parties refer to this as the turnover

order.)

While Sharif appealed this ruling, see Wellness Interna

‐

tional Network, Ltd. v. Sharif

, 727 F.3d 751 (7th Cir. 2013),

rev’d

, 575 U.S. 665 (2015), Haifa and Ragda sought control of

the trust assets, first in state court and then as intervenors in

Sharif’s bankruptcy case. None of their efforts succeeded. By

the bankruptcy court’s count, at least ten rulings between

2010 and 2015 addressed who owned the trust assets and

ruled against the sisters. Among these decisions was our 2015

affirmance of the bankruptcy court’s initial decision that the

trust and Sharif were alter egos, issued on remand from the

Supreme Court of the United States. See Wellness Int’l Net

‐

work, Ltd. v. Sharif

, 617 F. App’x 589, 591 (7th Cir. 2015).

These rulings also included the bankruptcy court’s denial

of Haifa’s 2015 motion on behalf of her mother’s estate to va

‐

cate the turnover order. See Fed. R. Civ. P. 60(b)(4). When the

trustee opposed the motion, Haifa attached to her reply brief

a theretofore

‐ unknown second will. Dated April 28, 2007—

two days after the will Sharif had produced five years ear

‐

lier—it purported to name Haifa the executor of their

mother’s estate. Haifa argued that the turno ver order was in

‐

valid because the court had no power to dispose of the Wattar

estate’s assets until the true executor received notice, and

Haifa allegedly had not been notified at the proper time.Nos. 17

‐ 1615, 18

‐ 2197 & 22

‐ 2826 5

The bankruptcy court denied Haifa’s motion after making

some critical findings: (1) Haifa had in fact received notice of

the proceedings; (2) the second will was forged; (3) even if it

were genuine, Haifa still lacked an interest in the disputed as

‐

sets, which were property of the trust no matter who the will’s

executor was; and (4) in any event, laches barred Haifa’s claim

because she had unreasonably delayed pursuing it. Along the

way, the court found that Haifa’s testimony that she had not

received notice of the bankruptcy proceedings or turnover or

‐

der was not credible. The district court (Judge Pacold) af

‐

firmed.

In 2016, the sisters requested leave of the bankruptcy court

to sue Trustee Fox and his attorney for violating their rights

when the trustee moved for the transfer of trust assets to Sha

‐

rif’s bankruptcy estate. Advance permission from the bank

‐

ruptcy court is required to sue a trustee for actions taken in

that capacity. See In re Linton

, 136 F.3d 544, 545 (7th Cir. 1998).

The sisters, now represented by Maurice Salem

, identified

their prospective suit as a Fifth Amendment due

‐ process

claim under Bivens v. Six Unknown Named Agents of Federal Bu

‐

reau of Narcotics

, 403 U.S. 388 (1971). At the same time, Ragda

moved for funds from the bankruptcy estate to reimburse her

‐

self for mortgage and tax payments she claimed to have made

on the family home between 2010 and 2015. She also asserted

that she was the proper beneficiary of Wattar ’s life insurance

policy and was owed the proceeds because they were exempt

from bankruptcy under Illinois law. See 735 ILCS 5/12

‐ 1001(f).

The bankruptcy court denied the sisters leave to sue after

concluding that they failed to make the required initial show

‐ ing that their claims had some foundation. Their one

‐ page

motion trailed off midsentence, and the attached complaint6 Nos. 17

‐ 1615, 18

‐ 2197 & 22

‐ 2826

sought to sue Fox and his attorney under Bivens for depriving

them of property without “notice and a hearing.” As for

Ragda’s motion, the bankruptcy court concluded that she

cited no statutory or contractual basis for recouping her al

‐ leged expenditures on the home. Indeed, Ragda conceded

that the payments were voluntary. Further, the bankruptcy

exemption she invoked for the insurance proceeds did not ap

‐ ply to her; it is for dependents of the insured, which Ragda

was not. Furthermore, only debtors can invoke exemptions,

and Ragda had no claim to be the debtor.

The bankruptcy court then ordered Salem, Ragda, and

Haifa to show cause why they should not be sanctioned. After

receiving their responses and holding a hearing, the bank

‐

ruptcy court concluded that their 2016 motions violated Fed

‐

eral Rule of Bankruptcy Procedure 9011 because they lacked

a basis in law or evidence. The cour t further concluded that

the motions had been filed “to harass the bankruptcy trustee,

cause unnecessary delay and

... increase the cost of litiga

‐

tion,” and actually had increased the bankruptcy estate’s liti

‐ gation expenses. After reviewing in detail the history of the

decade

‐ plus bankruptcy litigation and the sisters’ attempts to

siphon off assets controlled by Sharif (and his other creditors),

the court further determined that Salem, Ragda, and Haifa

displayed “repeated disregard for the facts and the law” and

that “[t]ime and again, [they] have shown a complete disre

‐ gard for the judicial system, making blatant attempts to cir

‐

cumvent it.” On that basis, the court issued sanctions: it

barred Salem, Ragda, and Haifa from any further filings in the

bankruptcy case and fined Salem $20,000. On appeal, the dis

‐

trict court (Judge Dow) affirmed the denial of the motions and

imposition of sanctions.Nos. 17

‐ 1615, 18

‐ 2197 & 22

‐ 2826 7

These events resulted in three separate appeals to this

court. We initially consolidated the appeals of the rulings on

the 2016 motions and sanctions, while Haifa’s appeal of the

denial of her motion to vacate proceeded in parallel. We now

conclude that further consolidation is desirable. All thr ee ap

‐ peals spring from the same bankruptcy case and rest on a

common factual background, and so it makes sense to resolve

them together. We note that Salem has been suspended from

the practice of law and, because he is proceeding pro se

, he

may represent only himself. Neve rtheless, in their joint brief

Haifa and Ragda adopt Salem’s appellate arguments about

their 2016 motions and sanctions. See Fed. R. App. P. 28(i).

II

On appeal, Haifa challenges the denial of her 2015 motion

to vacate the turnover of trust assets; Haifa and Ragda chal

‐ lenge the deni al of their 2016 motions; and the two sisters and

Salem all challenge the sanctions. Each of the challenged rul

‐ ings pertains to a discrete matter within the overarching

bankruptcy, and the bankruptcy court disposed of each one

definitively. Both the district court and this court thus have

jurisdiction over the appeals. 28 U.S.C. §§ 158(a), (d)(1); Rit zen

Grp., Inc. v. Jackson Masonry, LLC

, 140 S. Ct. 582, 586–87 (2020).

We review the bankruptcy court’s findings of fact for clear er

‐

ror and the legal conclusions of both the bankruptcy court and

district court de novo

, with special deference to the bankruptcy

court’s assessment of credibility. In re Dimas

, 14 F.4th 634,

639–40, 642 (7th Cir. 2021). We may affirm on any basis sup

‐ ported by the record, as long as it was raised below and the

appellants had the opportunity to contest it. McHenry County

v. Raoul

, 44 F.4th 581, 588 (7th Cir. 2022); In re Airadigm8 Nos. 17

‐ 1615, 18

‐ 2197 & 22

‐ 2826

Commc ʹ ns, Inc.

, 616 F.3d 642, 652 (7th Cir. 2010) (bankruptcy

appeal).

A. Motion to Vacate the Turnover of Trust Assets

Recall that in 2015 Haifa moved to vacate the court’s order

requiring the trust assets to be turned over to the bankruptcy

estate. Haifa contends that this step was necessary because,

after the bankruptcy court’s ruling, she obtained a newer ver

‐

sion of the second will—this one certified by a Syrian court—

that proves its veracity. She repeats her argument that her

mother’s estate was not bound by the turnover order because

she, as purported executor, never received notice.

Though Haifa primarily challenges the bankruptcy court’s

finding that the second will is a forgery, we can resolve her

appeal without wading into that morass. Even if Haifa were

really the executor, she simply waited too long to assert the

estate’s rights. In the bankruptcy and district courts, the trus

‐

tee raised the equitable defense of laches, which cuts off th e

right to sue when (1) the plaintiff has inexcusably delayed

bringing suit, and (2) that delay harmed the defendant. See

Teamsters & Emps. Welfare Tr. v. Gorman Bros. Ready Mix

, 283

F.3d 877, 880 (7th Cir. 2002). Haifa does not meaningfully dis

‐

pute the assertion that the delay was prejudicial to the bank

‐

ruptcy estate, nor could she: if the second will controls, the

trustee has been allocating assets improperly for years. We

therefore focus on whether the dela y is excusable.

Haifa’s explanation for her years

‐ long delay in producin g

and seeking to enforce the second will is unconvincing. She

first argues that she lacked notice of the bankruptcy proceed

‐ ings or turnover order. But even if, despite being a creditor,

she was not served with filings or copies of rulings, we see noNos. 17

‐ 1615, 18

‐ 2197 & 22

‐ 2826 9

error in the bankruptcy court’s determination that Haifa had

actual notice. Among other things, the record shows that

Haifa and Ragda filed a state

‐ court complaint in July 2010 that

discussed the bankruptcy and the alter

‐ ego order. Haifa gives

us no reason not to defer to the bankruptcy court’s assess

‐

ment—based on inconsistent statements in other proce edings

and her participation in the state

‐ court litigation—that

Haifa’s testimony about when she learned of the bankruptcy

was not credible. Dimas

, 14 F.4th at 642.

Haifa next argues that she could not act until 2015 because

the Supreme Court was considering a decision of this court,

which, acc ording to Haifa had “vacated” the turnover order

in Sharif’s appeal. Our decision, Haifa says, meant that the

probate estate was “winning the trust” back from the bank

‐

ruptcy estate, and she had to wait for her brother’s Supreme

Court appeal to conclude. That was not the nature of Sharif’s

appeal. But, in any case, we issued our decision in August

2013, meaning that Haifa had three years before then to chal

‐ lenge the turnover order. After all, she purports to have been

aware of the second will from the time it was executed in 2007

and does not explain why she did not invoke it as soon as her

brother began to act as executor. Further, Haifa’s assertion is

simply that she was the executor, and in that capacity was en

‐

titled to notice—she never has disputed that even under her

version of th e will, her mother’s assets passed directly to the

trust, which Haifa has never controlled. In short, her reasons

for waiting are muddled at best and do not outweigh the prej

‐

udice to the bankruptcy estate.

The district court gave other reasons, including collateral

estoppel, for rejecting Haifa’s attempt to invalidate the10 Nos. 17

‐ 1615, 18

‐ 2197 & 22

‐ 2826

turnover order. We have no reason to reach these issues and

express no opinion on them.

B. The 2016 Motions

Next, both sisters assert that the district court applied the

wrong standard when it reviewed the bankruptcy court’s de

‐

nial of their motion for leave to sue the trustee. They assert

that the dis trict court should have reversed because the bank

‐

ruptcy court failed to assess whether they made a prima facie

case for the trustee’s violation of their rights. But the bank

‐

ruptcy court committed no such error. In its lengthy order dis

‐ cussing the motion’s failings, the court simply made an as

‐

sessment with which they disagree.

The bankruptcy court correctly concluded that the motion

did not set forth a prima facie case for a right to relief against

the trustee. It made no case at all: the motion trails off and

does not even present a complete argument. And the argu

‐

ment it does attempt to present is frivolous. The sisters did

not explain then—nor do they now—why they could sue a

Chapter 7 trustee under Bivens

.

The Supreme Court has repeatedly “emphasized that rec

‐ ognizing a cause of action under Bivens is ‘a disfavored judi

‐

cial activity.’” Egbert v. Boule

, 142 S. Ct. 1793, 1802 (2022)

(quoting Ziglar v. Abbasi

, 582 U.S. 120, 135 (2017)). To deter

‐

mine whether a plaintiff has stated a Bivens claim, we first

must “ask whether the case presents ‘a new Bivens context’—

i.e.

, is it ‘meaningful[ly]’ different from the three cases in

which the Court has implied a damages action.” Id. at 1803

(quoting Ziglar

, 582 U.S. at 139). If so, we consider whether

“there are ‘special factors’ indicating that the Judiciary is at

least arguably less equipped than Congress ‘to weigh theNos. 17

‐ 1615, 18

‐ 2197 & 22

‐ 2826 11

costs and benefits of allowing a damages action to proceed.’”

Id. (quoting Ziglar

, 582 U.S. at 136). “[E]ven a single reason to

pause” is sufficient to bar the recognition of a new Bivens the

‐

ory. Id. (internal quotations omitted).

The proposed claim here fails both steps. First, there is no

doubt that the sisters’ claim that the Chapter 7 trustee and his

counsel violated their Fifth Amendment due

‐ process rights

represents a new Bivens context. See id. at 1803 (stating that

cases involving “a new category of defendants” represent

new contexts (internal quotations omitted)). Second, the

unique nature of a bankruptcy trustee’s role is more than suf

‐

ficient reason to pause before recognizing a Bivens action

against a trustee. Trustees have attributes of both private and

state actors. They are not federal employees; they are private

representatives appointed or elected to protect a bankruptcy

estate. See 11 U.S.C. § 701(a)(1) (granting the U.S. Trustee the

power to appoint a “disinterested person” from “the panel of

private trustees” as an interim trustee). Nor are Chapter 7

trustees fully on the government’s payroll. Aside from a nom

‐

inal fee of $60 to $120 per case, trustees are paid by the bank

‐

ruptcy estate, not the federal government. See 11 U.S.C.

§§ 330(b), 330(e) (nominal flat fees); 11 U.S.C. §§ 326(a), 330(a)

(variable compensation tied to the value of assets in the es

‐

tate). And like public defenders, who the Supreme Court has

held are not state actors for purposes of section 1983 claims

despite their government employment, see Polk County v.

Dodson

, 454 U.S. 312, 325 (1981), private trustees must repre

‐

sent the interests of the bankruptcy estate, not the interests of

the government. See Dechert v. Cadle Co.

, 333 F.3d 801, 802 (7th

Cir. 2003) (explaining that trustees “hav[e] fiduciary obliga

‐

tions exclusively to the estate in bankruptcy”). Indeed, like

public defenders, trustees may sometimes find themselves to12 Nos. 17

‐ 1615, 18

‐ 2197 & 22

‐ 2826

be the state’s adversaries. See, e.g.

, United States v. Nordic Vil

‐ lage Inc.

, 503 U.S. 30 (1992) (abrogated by statute) (involving a

suit brought by a trustee against the IRS).

In some contexts, however, the bankruptcy trustee may be

viewed as a sort of “court officer.” See Norton Bankr. L. & P.

3d § 28:1, Westlaw (database updated May 2023). From this

perspective, “a trustee in bankruptcy is working in effect for

the court that appointed or approved him, administering

property that has come under the court’s control by virtue of

the Bankruptcy Code.” In re Linton

, 136 F.3d at 545. For that

reason, courts have long held that a plaintiff seeking to sue a

trustee “concerning actions taken by him in the course of his

trusteeship must obtain the permission of the bankruptcy

court.” See id. at 545–47 (discussing the development of the

doctrine and affirming its applicability to suits against trus

‐

tees in state court). Relatedly, courts have recognized that

trustees enjoy some degree of immunity for acts taken pursu

‐

ant to court orders or within the scope of their trusteeship,

though the contours of this doctrine remain unsettled. See,

e.g.

, In re McKenzie

, 716 F.3d 404, 413 (6th Cir. 2013) (explain

‐ ing that, although “[b]ankruptcy trustees serve in a variety of

functions and may be immune for some but not all of those

functions,

... a bankruptcy trustee is ordinarily entitled to

quasi

‐judicial (or derivative) immunity from suit by third par

‐

ties for actions taken in his official capacity”); In re Harris

, 590

F.3d 730, 742 (9th Cir. 2009) (“Bankruptcy trustees are entitled

to broad immunity from suit when acting within the scope of

their authority and pursuant to court order.” (quoting Bennett

v. Williams

, 892 F.2d 822, 823 (9th Cir. 1989))).

In sum, the unique nature of the trustee’s role is sufficient

to counsel hesitation before recognizing an implied cause ofNos. 17

‐ 1615, 18

‐ 2197 & 22

‐ 2826 13

action for money damages against a trustee, especially in light

of Congress’s broad power to “establish

... uniform Laws on

the subject of Bankruptcies throughout the United States.”

U.S. Const. art. I, § 8, cl. 4. We therefore decline to recognize

the proposed Bivens claim.

The sisters also develop no argument supporting a legal

basis for Ragda to recoup the mortgage and tax payments she

allegedly made, or to receive the life insurance proceeds that

were payable to the trust as beneficiary (and then transferred

to the bankruptcy estate). The sisters’ challenges to the denial

of the 2016 motions are underdeveloped and unsupported by

law. Indeed, we would have been within our rights to con

‐

sider them waived, see Puffer v. Allstate Ins. Co.

, 675 F.3d 709,

718 (7th Cir. 2012), but we have attempted to address the ar

‐

guments we can discern.

C. The Bankru ptcy Court’s Sanctions

We review for abuse of discretion the bankruptcy court’s

imposition of sanctions on Ragda, Haifa, and Salem. See In re

Rinaldi

, 778 F.3d 672, 676 (7th Cir. 2015). Those sanctions in

‐

cluded a bar on further filings in the bankruptcy case plus a

$20,000 fine for Salem. We find no such abus e here—indeed,

we find nothing wrong with the court’s action. Salem princi

‐ pally argues that sanctions were inappropriate because the

motions he filed were not “another attempt to obtain the same

relief” sought in previous motions and were therefore not re

‐ petitive. While this may be true in the narrow sense—no party

previously sought to sue the bankruptcy trustee under

Bivens —the bankruptcy court reasonably concluded that

these motions represented yet another refusal to accept its de

‐

cision that the trust assets were part of the bankruptcy estate.14 Nos. 17

‐ 1615, 18

‐ 2197 & 22

‐ 2826

Salem’s focus on repetitiveness misses the point. The

bankruptcy court determined that no argument in the 2016

motions was supported by fact or law and that the motions

were intended to harass the trustee and increase the cost of

litigation. See Fed. R. Bankr. P. 9011(b)(1)–(2). As discussed

above, the appellants present no legal basis for their motions,

even as they appeal the rulings. And they do not address the

bankruptcy court’s finding that those motions were intended

to harass the trustee and needlessly increase the cost of litiga

‐

tion. They offer only the bare and incorrect assertion th at the

bankruptcy court’s lengthy sanctions order failed to address

certain issues. The burden is on the appellants to tell us why

the sanctions were so off

‐ base that imposing them was an

abuse of discretion. They cannot prevail when they fail to en

‐

gage with the reasons why the bankruptcy court impo sed,

and the district court upheld, the sanctions. See Klein v.

O ʹ Brien

, 884 F.3d 754, 757 (7th Cir. 2018). We add that barring

these litigants from further filings in the bankruptcy action

was a sensible response to their frivolous attempts to under

‐

mine long

‐ settled issues.

III

We have considered appellants’ other arguments, includ

‐ ing Salem’s umbrage at the documentation of his histo ry of

litigation misconduct outside of these cases and a frivolous

suggestion that the sanctions chill protected speech. None has

merit. We thus AFFIRM the judgments of the district courts.