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Opinion 463

Case Name: 

In re Burningham

Judge: 
Judge Boulden
Date: 
Dec-10-2004
Case Number(s): 
04-24586
Status: 

UNPUBLISHED

Body: 

The United States Trustee brought a motion seeking disgorgement of fees and fines against petition preparer for assisting a pro se chapter 7 debtor to complete her petition, schedules and statement of financial affairs. The following issues were determined: First, it is a violation of § 110(g) for a petition preparer to collect a debtor's filing fee even if made payable to the U.S. Bankruptcy Court; however, in this case, the violation was sufficiently remedied and only a nominal sanction of $1 was issued. Second, the fee charged by the petition preparer is reasonable for the services rendered pursuant to § 110(h)(2). Third, there is insufficient evidence that the petition preparer received an additional $100 cash paid by the debtor as alleged by the United States Trustee and although the petition preparer did not report the courier fee on his Disclosure of Compensation, he remedied the problem by discontinuing the practice of using a courier and no fraud was perpetrated against the Court for either omission; however, the Court required disgorgement of the $20 courier fee to the debtor as required by the Code. Finally, based on the facts presented, no violation for the prohibition of practicing law without a licence for the petition preparer's explanation of the chapters of bankruptcy and no violation for filling out the schedules and statement of financial affairs. However, the Court did find that allowing a software program to select state exemptions for a debtor constitutes the unauthorized practice of law in violation of § 110(k).While the Court determined that the petition preparer violated some portions of § 110, it pointed out that the petition preparer made a tremendous effort to bring his company into compliance with the Bankruptcy Code and local practice which was a mitigating factor in issuing sanctions.

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Opinion 463
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