Court Opinion

ID: 9852270
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-09-24 05:27:32.499844+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T09:22:24.901071
License: Public Domain

Smith, Presiding Judge,
dissenting.
In a number of carefully reasoned opinions, this court has carved out a very limited exception to the application of the doctrine of judicial estoppel. We have held that when two factors are present, we will not apply the doctrine to prevent a debtor from bringing an action on a claim that was omitted from a bankruptcy petition. These factors are: (1) that the debtor did something to remedy the omission in the bankruptcy court; and (2) that the debtor did not benefit from the omission at the expense of his creditors. See, e.g., McBride v. Brown, 246 Ga. App. 149, 150 (538 SE2d 863) (2000). Because I cannot agree that the exception should be extended to include a case where only one of these factors is present, I respectfully dissent.
The majority ignores the fact that McBride clearly makes the two factors conjunctive; I have found no cases when the disjunctive was used or the two conditions were alternatives. Certainly, when the bankruptcy petition is actually amended, the debtor has satisfied the first condition, as well as the second. But the reverse is not true. And in my view, we should not allow the debtor to take advantage of the exception when he or she has sat idly by and made absolutely no attempt to remedy the omission. This is surely an invitation to deception. I would affirm the trial court’s grant of summary judgment to *607IBF because Dillard-Winecoff’s claims against IBF were barred by the doctrine of judicial estoppel.
Decided July 16, 2001
Hipes & Norton, Albert L. Norton, Jr., John E. Bellus, Jr., Kilpatrick Stockton, Jeffrey J. Toney, for appellant.
Weinstock & Scavo, Richard J. Capriola, Mark I. Sanders, Susan B. Jacobs, for appellees.
I am authorized to state that Presiding Judge Andrews joins in this dissent.