In Bethea v. Equifax (W.D.N.C. Dec. 19, 2025), Judge Kenneth Bell offers both a procedural refresher and a cautionary tale for consumer litigants hoping to convert technical missteps into instant victory.
Judge Laura Beyer’s decision in In re Holland drives home a now-settled point in North Carolina bankruptcy practice: if a debtor does not intend to keep collateral and make payments, then the debtor does not get to deduct those payments on the Chapter 7 means test.
In this Western District case, the pro se plaintiff, Brittney Moseley, brought what has become a fairly common species of Fair Credit Reporting Act litigation — alleging that a lender “pulled” her credit report without authorization and, in the process, violated both the FCRA and North Carolina’s Unfair and Deceptive Trade Practices Act.
In In re Granite City Mechanical, Inc., the Bankruptcy Court for the Western District of North Carolina (Judge Laura T. Beyer) held that the United States may offset unpaid Employee Retention Tax Credits (ERTCs) against a debtor’s outstanding COVID-19 EIDL loan owed to the SBA.
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.
In In re Joiner, Case No. 25-30396 (Bankr. W.D.N.C. Oct. 2 2025) (Judge Ashley Austin Edwards), the court addressed the intersection between Subchapter V’s debtor-friendly lien modification authority under § 1190(3) and a creditor’s long-standing right under § 1111(b)(2) to elect to have an undersecured claim treated as fully secured.
In Shaf International, Inc. v. Mohammed (W.D.N.C. Sept. 22, 2025), Judge Reidinger affirmed the Bankruptcy Court’s grant of summary judgment to the debtor, holding that a single creditor lacks standing to assert fiduciary duty claims against the officer of an insolvent corporation where the injury alleged is common to all creditors.
In In re Ryan Lashon Ford, Judge Edwards issued two companion opinions chronicling the court’s escalating efforts to bring order to what she aptly described as an “atypical” pro se Chapter 7 case that had metastasized into a performative exercise in pseudo-law.
