[DO NOT PUBLISH]

In the

United States Court of Appeals

For the Eleventh Circuit

____________________

No. 21-13082

Non-Argument Calendar

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In Re: Lee Wendell Loder,

Adrianne Lawnyette Ragland Loder,

Debtors.

___________________________________________________

LEE WENDELL LODER, 

Plaintiff-Appellant,

versus

ICEMAKERS INC., 

Defendant-Appellee.

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2 Opinion of the Court 21-13082

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Appeal from the United States District Court

for the Northern District of Alabama

D.C. Docket No. 2:20-cv-01372-LSC

____________________

Before JORDAN, BRANCH, and GRANT, Circuit Judges.

PER CURIAM:

Lee Loder challenges the bankruptcy court’s refusal to stop

Icemakers, Inc. from enforcing a state-court judgment against him. 

We affirm the bankruptcy court’s denial of his motions.

I. 

This appeal stems from a bitter seventeen-year dispute 

between Loder and Icemakers over a debt of less than $6,000.1 In 

early 2007, Loder and Icemakers entered into a consent judgment 

regarding this debt in Alabama state court. Shortly thereafter,

Loder and his wife filed for Chapter 7 bankruptcy, and Icemakers 

filed a complaint for nondischargability. Loder and Icemakers

settled in October 2007, leading to a federal consent judgment that 

declared the debt nondischargeable, but that did not otherwise 

reference the state-court proceedings or the appropriate interest 

rate for the debt. 

1 We assume the parties’ familiarity with this litigation’s facts and procedural 

history and only discuss those elements necessary to resolving this appeal.

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21-13082 Opinion of the Court 3

Nearly ten years later—after various failed efforts to collect 

the debt—Icemakers filed a motion to revive the state-court 

judgment in 2017. Loder then filed a “Motion for Contempt &

Sanctions for Violation of the Bankruptcy Discharge” and a 

“Motion for Summary Judgment on the Issue of Liability for 

Violation of the Discharge Injunction” before the bankruptcy 

court. He argued that Icemakers’ actions in state court violated the 

2007 federal consent judgment because the bankruptcy consent 

order created a “new, replacement judgment” that displaced the 

state-court judgment, making Icemakers’ efforts to revive the statecourt judgment a sanctionable defiance of the bankruptcy court. 

Icemakers filed its own motion for summary judgment. The 

bankruptcy court granted Icemakers’ motion and denied Loder’s. 

Loder appealed, and the district court affirmed, holding that “the 

only effect of the Bankruptcy Court judgment was to render the 

debt Loder owed Icemakers nondischargeable. It did not replace 

the state court judgment with a new money judgment.” Loder v. 

Icemakers, Inc., No. 2:18-cv-00812-LSC, 2019 WL 10784382, at *4 

(N.D. Ala. Feb. 27, 2019). Loder then appealed to this Court, which

also affirmed. In re Loder, 796 Fed.Appx 698 (11th Cir. 2020) 

(unpublished). 

On remand, Loder filed a two-page “Motion to Enforce 

Settlement Agreement & for Temporary Restraining Order,”

arguing—as he had in his prior motion—that the federal consent 

judgment displaced the state-court judgment against him, and that 

Icemakers’ efforts to enforce the state-court judgment were thus 

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improper. On August 28, 2020, the bankruptcy court denied 

Loder’s motion. It noted that Icemakers had tried to collect the 

state-court judgment for nearly 13 years, that the 2007 federal 

consent judgment did not purport to replace the state-court 

judgment, and that the 2007 federal consent judgment did not 

address the rate of interest to be applied to the debt. And given 

Loder’s earlier appeals, it held that “principles of res judicata and 

collateral estoppel apply here.” Within a week of the bankruptcy 

court’s August 28 order, Loder twice moved for reconsideration, 

and the bankruptcy court denied both motions. 

Loder appealed these orders to the district court, and 

Icemakers moved to dismiss the appeal as frivolous. The district 

court affirmed the bankruptcy court and partially granted 

Icemakers’ motion. Loder appealed both the district court’s 

determination that his appeal was frivolous and the district court’s 

order affirming the bankruptcy court, after which Icemakers 

moved to dismiss this appeal as frivolous too. Loder then moved 

to dismiss his own appeal for lack of jurisdiction, and this Court 

partially granted that motion—holding that we lacked jurisdiction 

to review the district court’s finding that the appeal was frivolous,

but that we had jurisdiction to review the district court’s order 

affirming the bankruptcy court. We now resolve what remains of 

this appeal.

II. 

Loder affirmatively limits his appeal of the bankruptcy 

court’s August 28 order denying his motion to enforce the 

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settlement agreement (and his appeal of the denials of his motions 

to reconsider)—he only challenges “the bankruptcy court’s factual 

findings that contradicted the debtor’s assertion that the parties 

intended to limit their options contractually in the bankruptcy 

settlement agreement.” He thus waives any challenge to the 

bankruptcy court’s holding that his motion was procedurally 

barred based on its old factual findings, instead only challenging an 

arguably new factual finding that the parties did not mutually 

intend that the federal consent agreement would replace the statecourt judgment against Loder. 

We review the factual findings of a bankruptcy court for 

clear error. In re Optical Techs., Inc., 425 F.3d 1294, 1300 (11th Cir. 

2005). “We will not find clear error unless our review of the record 

leaves us with the definite and firm conviction that a mistake has 

been committed.” Jackson Nat’l Life Ins. Co. v. Crum, 25 F.4th 

854, 859 (11th Cir. 2022) (quotation omitted).

Assuming that Loder’s challenge is procedurally 

appropriate, he has not shown that the bankruptcy court’s factual 

findings were clear error.2 His briefing is conclusory; he gives no 

evidence from the record that the parties actually did intend to 

have the 2007 federal consent judgment replace the state-court 

2 The parties do not fully brief the procedural issues raised by a limited appeal 

of new factual findings in an order that otherwise holds that a motion is 

procedurally barred. Because Loder’s arguments fail even if this appeal is 

procedurally proper, we decline to address those issues. 

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judgment. As for the bankruptcy court’s findings on their own 

terms, that court reasonably observed that Icemakers’ actions are 

inconsistent with an agreement to exclusively resolve matters

before the bankruptcy court, and it correctly noted the limited 

terms of the 2007 federal consent judgment. Our review of the 

record does not leave us with a definite and firm conviction that a 

mistake has been made. Given that Loder challenges no other 

elements of the bankruptcy court’s orders, this lack of clear error

resolves his appeal. 

III. 

That leaves Icemakers’ motion to dismiss this appeal as 

frivolous. We will only dismiss appeals as frivolous if they are 

“utterly devoid of merit.” Parker v. Am. Traffic Sols., Inc., 835 F.3d 

1363, 1371 (11th Cir. 2016) (quotation omitted). Because Loder 

only sought a limited review of factual findings by the bankruptcy 

court that were at least arguably new, we cannot call his appeal

utterly devoid of merit. Moreover, although this Court found that 

we lacked jurisdiction over Loder’s original challenge to the district 

court’s dismissal of that appeal as frivolous, Loder’s apparent 

original belief that this Court had jurisdiction over that order also 

was not utterly devoid of merit. We thus deny Icemakers’ motion. 

* * *

We AFFIRM the district court’s order affirming the 

bankruptcy court’s denial of Loder’s motions and DENY 

Icemakers’ motion to dismiss this appeal as frivolous.

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