As covered much more fully over at Kemplog the Union County Treasurer has been unable to get a bond which she is required to do to take office. Because of a bankruptcy she and her husband filed two years ago, she is apparently unable to find a bonding company to post the $225,000 bond she has to have to take office. Today, hte Palladium-Item is reporting that she has decided to resign her position. Union County Republicans will select her replacement. Hopefully the party of personal responsibility will choose someone who hasn’t stiffed their creditors.
According to the docket of Case No. 03-11663-AJM-13 filed in the U.S. Bankruptcy Court for the Southern District of Indiana, the Thibauts filed a Chapter 7 bankruptcy on June 24, 2003. That was converted to a Chapter 13 in October, 2003. An interesting development which may or may not have affected insurers or financial institutions’ willingness to post bond was the Debtors’ Motion to Avoid Union County Banks’ lien on something. Unfortunately, the Southern District is inferior to the Northern District with respect to the availability of documents online, so I don’t really know what that is about.
When I’ve been involved with such things, what usually happens is that my client has a judgment against a debtor who files bankruptcy. That judgment acts as a lien against property in the county. When a debtor files bankruptcy, their house usually has a mortgage which has priority over my judgment lien. They also get an exemption ($7,500 I believe). So, if Mortgage + Exemption > Value of Real Estate, then my judgment lien is impairing their exemption and they are entitled to avoid the judgment lien. Like I said, I don’t know the specifics of the Thibaut case, but Union County Bank objected to the Thibauts’ Motion but then apparently failed to show for the hearing and so they got out from under the lien.
According to the claims register of the bankruptcy court, creditors claimed $422,000 in debt which was apparently $317,000 secured and $104,000 unsecured. Looks to be a fair amount of credit card debt and Union County Nat’l Bank looks to be mostly secured but with at least $84,000 in unsecured debt. Chapter 13 plans usually manage to pay off secured debt and then leave unsecured creditors with next to nothing.
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