Opinion ID: 2780845
Heading Depth: 3
Heading Rank: 3

Heading: Merits of Summary Judgment

Text: Under Rule 56, as incorporated by Federal Rule of Bankruptcy Procedure 7056, a court “shall grant summary judgment if the movant shows that there is no genuine dispute as to any material fact and the movant is entitled to judgment as a matter of law.” Fed. R. Civ. P. 56(a). The court may, after giving notice and a reasonable time to respond, grant summary judgment for a nonmovant or consider summary judgment on its own after identifying for the parties material facts that may not be genuinely in dispute. Fed. R. Civ. P. 56(f). A court may sua sponte grant summary judgment “so long as the losing party was on notice that [it] had to come forward with all of [its] evidence.” Celotex Corp. v. Catrett, 477 U.S. 317, 326, 106 S. Ct. 2548, 2554 (1986). “A party asserting that a fact . . . is genuinely disputed must support the assertion by . . . citing to particular parts of materials in the record . . . or . . . showing that the materials cited do not establish the absence or presence of a genuine dispute.” Fed. R. Civ. P. 56(c). Here, the record demonstrates no genuine issue of material fact as to the ownership of Fisher Island and Little Rest. We are not persuaded by the Zeltser Group’s unsubstantiated arguments to the contrary, particularly given the Zeltser Group’s total failure to raise any purported factual dispute in response to the 49 Case: 12-15595 Date Filed: 02/20/2015 Page: 50 of 57 bankruptcy court’s December 29, 2011 invitation to submit briefing. The Zeltser Group may not refuse to raise disputed issues before the bankruptcy court then later claim on appeal that disputed issues precluded summary judgment. Thus, the bankruptcy court correctly granted summary judgment sua sponte in favor of the Redmond Group.