Court Opinion

ID: 9687565
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-24 16:36:11.832709+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T18:18:28.819562
License: Public Domain

KRESSEL, Chief Judge,
concurring.
While I think the majority is correctly affirming the bankruptcy court’s order overruling the trustee’s objection to the debtors’ exemption claim, the majority opinion ranges outside the issues properly raised by the appeal of that order and I think thereby exceeds our jurisdiction. As the majority opinion indicates, the trustee was engaged in two related, but separate, proceedings. The trustee filed an adversary proceeding against Kerri’s father, in which he sought to avoid a security interest that he held in the debtors’ car. In its order and judgment, the bankruptcy court did not grant the trustee the relief he sought, but rather, held, by way of declaratory judgment, that Kerri’s father did not have a valid lien on the car. The trustee did not appeal from that judgment.
Going on at the same time was the trustee’s objection to the debtors’ claim of *908exemption in their car. . In his objection, the trustee relied on § 522(g) which allows a debtor to exempt property recovered by the trustee under §§ 510(c)(2), 542, 543, 550, 551, or 553, but only to the extent the transfer of the property recovered was not voluntary and the debtor did not conceal it. In an order dated the same day as the judgment in the adversary proceeding, the bankruptcy court correctly pointed out that it had held in the adversary proceeding that Kerri’s father held no lien in the car and therefore the trustee did not avoid any lien nor recover the car or its value under any of the denominated sections. As a result, the debtors were entitled to claim the car exempt. It is from that order that the trustee appealed.
In its opinion, the majority does a thorough job of discussing and deciding the issues raised in the adversary proceeding. While I do not necessarily disagree with any of the majority’s analysis, because the bankruptcy court’s judgment in the adversary proceeding was not appealed, I think that it is unnecessary and outside the proper scope of our review. “[Wjhen a court decides upon a rule of law, that decision should continue to govern the same issues in subsequent stages in the same case.” First Union Nat’l Bank v. Pictet Overseas Trust Corp., Ltd., 477 F.3d 616, 619-20 (8th Cir.2007) (quoting Morris v. American Nat’l Can Corp., 988 F.2d 50, 52 (8th Cir.1993)). “The doctrine applies to appellate decisions.” Id. “The law of the case doctrine prevents the relitigation of a settled issue in a case and requires courts to adhere to decisions made in earlier proceedings in order to ensure uniformity of decisions, protect the expectations of the parties, and promote judicial economy.” United States v. Bartsh, 69 F.3d 864, 866 (8th Cir.1995). In short, the bankruptcy court was required to adhere to its decision in the adversary proceeding when it faced the same issue in the exemption litigation. While the bankruptcy court did discuss the issue somewhat again as part of its decision in the exemption litigation, it did not purport to relitigate or redecide an issue that it had already decided in the adversary proceeding. Thus, it should have been a simple matter in this appeal for us to refer to the judgment in the adversary proceeding, which indicated that Kerri’s father had no lien, which meant there was no avoidance or recovery and therefore § 522(g) has no applicability. In this respect, the majority’s discussion about the law of creation and perfection of security interest, although excellent, is dictum at best.
In the same vein, since the trustee was a party to the adversary proceeding, principles of collateral estoppel would prevent him from relitigating those same issues in the exemption litigation or as part of this appeal.
I therefore join the majority, but for somewhat different reasons.