Legal Blog
The “Omnibus Order” – “Mutually Beneficial ‘Kitchen-sinking’” | Part Two
Recently, in a single Stipulated Final Order, in conjunction with a negotiated global settlement on behalf of a multi-million dollar judgment-creditor involving third-party rights in real property in which the judgment-debtor held an interest (and a host of other pending and potential forthcoming creditor’s rights enforcement proceedings), counsel and unrepresented parties managed to take a pending Circuit Court case from the pre-trial stage of (requiring amending the Complaint and allowing/adding an arguably necessary party and service issues consequent thereto) to a final order of dismissal.
With the cooperation of all but the judgment-debtor, counsel for all parties were able to consolidate into a single comprehensive order presented at a short and simple Motions Day docket presentation for the Court, a multi-party settlement of a pending post-judgment creditor’s rights complaint to sell the judgment-debtor’s real property asset.
In the omnibus consent order, agreed to and jointly presented by all but the judgment-debtor, the parties managed to cobble together in a manner ultimately found acceptable to the Court, all of the following: (i) allowing intervention and adding parties; (ii) defaulting the judgment-debtor; (iii) amending claims; (iv) accepting/waiving formal service; (v) stipulating to facts; (vi) stipulating to legal and factual findings and conclusions of law (and doing so in the alternative); (vii) making asset value determinations; (viii) allowing and deeming a private sale had and held with credits/setoffs determined and applied (and done in a manner so as to moot the need for otherwise required proceedings); (ix) entering judgment; and (x) awarding fee simple title transferred to the judgment-creditor.
There was no need for a sale, public or private; no commissioners needed to be appointed; no valuation hearings needed to be held. In this manner, the time and expense of proceeds allocation arguments or accountings were all avoided along with the potentially substantial expert and legal fees attendant to such procedural requirements. Rather than presume some or all of the foregoing would be necessary hoops through which the parties were required to jump, even if consensually, counsel cooperatively approached the global resolution with a collective eye towards minimizing time and expense for all involved while assuring that procedural corners were cut in such a way that no rights were prejudiced.
Faced with having to choose form or substance, sometimes “all of the above” works best!
ABOUT THOMAS REPCZYNSKI
As a Principal with Offit Kurman’s Commercial Litigation Group, Mr. Repczynski is an Estate and Trust litigator and business litigation lawyer emphasizing will/trust disputes, creditors’ rights enforcement, and B2B business disputes. Together with OK’s legal team now spanning from NYC to Charlotte, North Carolina, Tom provides general counsel to a wide array of businesses (foreign and domestic), associations (local and international non-profits), individuals (personally and in representative capacities), and lenders (traditional and Sharia) in federal, state, and bankruptcy courts as well as ADR and administrative proceedings relating primarily to inheritance-related disputes, general business contract and tort issues, and divorce-impacting bankruptcies. Over the past 30 years, Tom has co-owned and operated an exterior painting business and a used furniture business; clerked in the Starr OIC and interned at both Main Justice and the Court of Federal Claims; chaired two local Bar association Boards, two community architectural review boards (VA and NC), and the Committee of Boy Scout Troop 688. Tom currently chairs the South Fairfax Chamber of Commerce; announces local high school football games; actively supports local dance and musical theater; and umpires Little League games when time allows.
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