Opinion ID: 4563582
Heading Depth: 3
Heading Rank: 2

Heading: Combe Fill’s and Carter Day’s Bankruptcy

Text: Proceedings 9 In 1981, just as the Site was closing, Combe Fill filed for Chapter 7 protection in the Bankruptcy Court for the Southern District of New York. Both the United States and the State of New Jersey filed claims in that case, which were settled separately for $50,000 each. Combe Fill, its bankruptcy, and its settled claims are not directly at issue here. A year earlier, Carter Day filed in the same venue a separate petition for Chapter 11 protection. The Bankruptcy Court disallowed New Jersey’s claim there because only Combe Fill was liable for the costs of cleaning up the Site under New Jersey law. The United States did not file a claim against Carter Day in its bankruptcy case. In 1983, the USEPA notified Carter Day and roughly 190 other entities that they were PRPs for the Site’s cleanup costs. Carter Day sought a declaratory judgment in the District Court for the Southern District of New York that it had discharged its CERCLA liability in its bankruptcy reorganization. The District Court dismissed the case as unripe. And on appeal the Second Circuit declined to exercise its discretionary jurisdiction under the Declaratory Judgment Act because, inter alia, the USEPA investigation of the Site was at a preliminary stage and deciding the claim prematurely would interfere with “Congress’s policy of expediting cleanup.” In re Combustion Equip. Assocs., 838 F.2d at 40. Accordingly, neither the NJDEP nor the USEPA’s claim against Carter Day was fully resolved at that time.