Legal Question in Bankruptcy in Michigan

hello, this is lawrence castleberry and i need some advice. i live in southfield, michigan and i filed for bankruptcy in 2013 and it has been discharged now. i'm suing my bankruptcy lawyer because he forgot to add one of my creditors in my case, although i made sure i told him about them. i asked him to help me with this and now he said there's nothing he can do. but this one creditor is on my public records (a detainer they call it) and it's stopping me from being able to move to another apartment. we had a court date for 6/3/15 but his lawyer had it moved from small claims to a civil court now. is there anything i can do about this change of court suit ? do i need a lawyer too.


Asked on 6/02/15, 5:06 pm

3 Answers from Attorneys

Doug Dern Law Office of Doug Dern & Associates

Its still discharged under in re: maj. All you have to do is tell the creditor give them notice. You should be suing the creditor not your attorney

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Answered on 6/02/15, 5:19 pm
Andrew Campbell Andrew L Attorney at Law

When you file for bankruptcy you, as the person filing, you are making a representation that all debts are listed. The lawyer is not making that representation, the debtor is doing so. So even if you told your lawyer, it was you that signed those documents without the debt being listed. From time to time some debts are simply forgotten as this is human nature. The debt, even if it is a judgment, is still discharged by operation of law as long as it was a Chapter 7 no asset case. A no asset case means that the trustee did not take any assets and sell them for the benefit of creditors. This simply means that because nothing was lost by the creditor because you failed to list them, there was no harm to them. So if this was a no-asset Chapter 7 and not a Chapter 13 case and not a secured debt, then the debt is still discharged. Most of the time, people have trouble moving if there is an eviction on their record. An eviction is going to remain as part of your credit record until you remove it. Bankruptcy will not automatically remove it and no attorneys I know of even offer to help people remove judgments through the courts. Using MCL 600.2914, a person can remove a judgment but that statute defines a judgment as a decree or order for the payment of money. For many evictions there is no money judgment, it is simply an order for possession. So, assuming I am correct and that it was an no money judgment eviction, it will remain on your record and as part of your credit record. While bankruptcy can improve your credit score that is done primarily by eliminating debt while maintaining income which will increase a credit score. It cannot remove accurately stated credit notations that existed prior to your bankruptcy filing.

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Answered on 6/02/15, 5:35 pm
Charles Schneider Charles Schneider, P.C.

The debt you are speaking of is generally forgiven even if it was not listed in your bankruptcy case as long as you had a no asset case (you surrendered no property to the Trustee and he recovered no property for the estate) and the debt was not fraudulent or otherwise non-dischargeable under the bankruptcy code.

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Answered on 6/03/15, 8:43 am


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