Opinion ID: 616444
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 3

Heading: The Personal Bankruptcy Abandonment

Text: Donarumo and Murray Supply challenge the lower courts' determinations that the state court claims held by the personal bankruptcy estate that were not specifically named in the Notice of Intention to Abandon were in fact abandoned under 11 U.S.C. § 554(a). We review the bankruptcy court's findings of fact for clear error and its conclusions of law de novo. Spenlinhauer, 261 F.3d at 117. Section 554(a) provides that [a]fter notice and a hearing, the trustee may abandon any property of the estate that is burdensome to the estate or that is of inconsequential value and benefit to the estate. 11 U.S.C. § 554(a). However, a hearing is unnecessary if no party in interest requests one. Id. § 102(1). In this case, the Trustee filed a Notice of Intention to Abandon in the personal bankruptcy case on November 6, 2007. No parties in interest objected or requested a hearing, and the bankruptcy court approved the Notice on November 30, 2007. Donarumo and Murray Supply argue that only the claims specifically named in the Reasons for Abandonment section of the Notice were abandoned under § 554(a). It is true that a trustee's intent to abandon an asset must be clear and unequivocal. Chartschlaa v. Nationwide Mut. Ins. Co., 538 F.3d 116, 123 (2d Cir. 2008); see also In re the Sire Plan, Inc., 100 B.R. 690, 693 (Bankr.S.D.N.Y.1989) ([A]ny clear manifestation of the trustee's intent to abandon property will suffice.) (emphasis in original). But here, the Notice stated the Trustee's clear intent to abandon a cause of action against Andrew Donarumo et al. While the Trustee's description of the contours of the cause of action in the Reasons for Abandonment section could have been crisper, his intent to abandon all the claims held by the personal bankruptcy estate was obvious. [7] Despite only referring specifically to misrepresentation and other business related tort[s] in his Reasons for Abandonment, the Trustee made clear that the cause of action involved multiple theories of recovery ar[ising] from the purchase of a business known as Drew's Plumbing and Heating, Inc. II. As the bankruptcy court ably recited: [A]s painful as [the Notice] is to read, its meaning is unambiguous: The estate holds claims against Donarumo and perhaps others, arising from the purchase of a business that came to be known as Drew's Plumbing; and the Trustee notices parties in interest of his intention to abandon those claims, based on his determination, made after investigation, that the claims have no or negligible value to the estate. Furlong I, 437 B.R. at 720 (emphasis in original). [8] The lower courts were correct in finding that the Trustee's intent to abandon all state court claims under § 554(a) was clear and unequivocal, and that all of the claims were therefore abandoned when the bankruptcy court approved the Notice.