In Williams v. PennyMac Loan Services, LLC, the Middle District of North Carolina once again refused to let a mortgage servicer wriggle out of Pay-to-Pay fee litigation at the pleading stage. The Court denied PennyMac’s Rule 12(b)(6) motion in a detailed opinion that should feel very familiar to anyone who has been watching this line of cases develop since Alexander v. Carrington and, closer to home, Custer v. Dovenmuehle.

The Chapter 7 case of James and Sharon Bryant and the related adversary proceeding brought by Eastwood Construction Partners, LLC is not notable because it breaks new doctrinal ground. It is notable because it shows—almost clinically—how civil litigation spillover, aggressive creditor strategy, and pro se overconfidence (amplified by generative AI) can collide inside a consumer bankruptcy case.

Summary:

The Fourth Circuit affirmed summary judgment against DiStefano, a TastyKake distributor terminated after receiving three breach notices in three months for leaving expired product on shelves and failing to meet store service requirements. The contract explicitly allowed termination after more than two notices in a 12-month period, and DiStefano admitted it had no evidence the notices were wrong.

Summary:

In a case that reads like The Wolf of Wall Street meets Fixer Upper, the Fourth Circuit waded into an international fraud, a botched lis pendens, and a high-cost lender accused of acting as the “getaway driver” for a Baltimore restaurateur who managed to siphon nearly $7.8 million from a member of the Kuwaiti royal family.

Available at:  https://digitalcommons.law.seattleu.edu/sulr/vol49/iss1/4/

Summary:

The Western District of North Carolina (Judge Volk, sitting by designation) issued a consolidated Memorandum Opinion and Order denying attempts by asbestos claimants in Bestwall and Aldrich Pump/Murray Boiler to take an interlocutory appeal challenging the bankruptcy courts’ refusal to dismiss the Texas Two-Step cases for bad faith.

Available at: https://ssrn.com/abstract=5798042

Abstract:

Summary:

In a detailed but pragmatic opinion, Chief Judge Catherine Eagles offers a tidy roadmap for mortgage-servicing litigation in the Middle District — clarifying what sticks at the pleading stage (loss-mitigation fee violations, RESPA damages, UDTPA claims) and what gets tossed to the curb (negligence, joint venture fantasies, and the perennial “they threatened foreclosure!” count that courts treat like the boy who cried wolf).

Summary:

In In re Lombrano, Judge Kahn confronted the all-too-common BAPCPA problem of repeat filings colliding head-on with the automatic stay provisions. Ms. Lombrano—pro se—had filed three bankruptcy cases in under five months, two Chapter 7s (one dismissed for filing defects and jurisdictional issues, the next for nonpayment of the fee) followed by this Chapter 13.

Summary:

Judge Warren’s latest sanctions order reads like a greatest-hits compilation of the Eastern District’s prior encounters with bankruptcy document forgery—Wilds, Purdy, and now Williams—but with one glaring distinction: unlike Ms. Sugar, whose saga wound its way to the Fourth Circuit and back on the strength of a plausible (and ultimately successful) reliance on counsel argument, Deja Williams had no attorney to blame but herself.