Confirming Chapter 11 Case: How to Get to the Finish Line

As a partner in the firm’s Financial Restructuring Group, Thomas Kreller focuses on bankruptcy and corporate reorganization law and has represented debtors, lenders, equity holders, committees and acquirors in bankruptcy cases, loan restructurings and out-of-court workouts. Mr. Kreller has advised clients in large, complex transactions and high profile chapter 11 cases in jurisdictions across the country for 25 years, during which time he has established a reputation for courtroom excellence, strategic thinking and creative and pragmatic problem-solving.

Laura Day DelCotto has always held a passion for counseling and advocating for her clients over her more than 25-year career of practicing law. Laura Day sees her clients’ situations as an opportunity to create a persuasive message to advocate for their interests, with the other parties involved as well as in court when required. Through her experience, Laura Day has come to view this process as both an art and a science, and as a way to present the best chance to meet her clients’ goals and advocate their positions. “Everything we do falls on a spectrum of options, pros and cons, how it fits in to the big picture, negotiation, and risk analysis. I mostly see lots of gray and multiple choices of how to proceed, usually not a simple black and white answer. It is very important to me to make sure the clients get the benefit of what I see so they can make the best choices for themselves.”

Laura Day has handled many different kinds of cases over her career. She began as a young lawyer doing bank work, but says her heart grew to love the debtor side of the table. “The early years of my practice are invaluable to me, because I got to both write and argue so many motions in different courts across the Commonwealth, and learned to think about what the banks are looking for in a situation. I learned a lot of law in the process. As a debtor or committee lawyer, being able to understand and work with the other parties is an absolute necessity.” She believes in always trying to resolve issues consensually, while simultaneously preparing to go argue the matter in court if necessary. Laura Day holds many accolades from her peers in the legal profession community.

Outside of the office, Laura Day enjoys working in her yard, traveling, reading, and spending quality R&R time with her husband and grown children. She says she will never pass up a good patio gathering with her girlfriends. She is passionate about taking steps to make improvements in work/home life balance and equality of pay for today’s young women as well as young men, especially within the legal profession.

Hon. Robert D. Drain is a U.S. Bankruptcy Judge for the Southern District of New York in White Plains. Since his appointment, he has presided over such chapter 11 cases as Loral, RCN, Cornerstone, Refco, Allegiance Telecom, Delphi, Coudert Brothers, Frontier Airlines, Star Tribune, Reader’s Digest, A&P, Hostess Brands, Christian Brothers and Momentive. He also has presided over the ancillary or plenary cases of Corporacion Durango, Satellites Mexicanas, Parmalat S.p.A. and its affiliated U.S. debtors, Varig S.A., Yukos (II), SphinX, Galvex Steel, TBS Shipping, Excel Maritime, Nautilus, Landsbanki Islands, Roust and Ultrapetrol. He also has served as the court-appointed mediator in a number of chapter 11 cases, including New Page, Cengage, Quicksilver, LightSquared, Molycorp and Breitburn Energy.

Prior to his appointment to the bench in May 2002, Judge Drain was a partner in the bankruptcy department of Paul, Weiss, Rifkind, Wharton & Garrison, where he represented debtors, trustees, secured and unsecured creditors, official and unofficial creditors’ committees, and buyers of distressed businesses and distressed debt in chapter 11 cases, out-of-court restructurings and bankruptcy-related litigation. He was also actively involved in several transnational insolvency matters.

Judge Drain is a Fellow of the American College of Bankruptcy and a member and board member of ABI, a member of the International Insolvency Institute, a member and Secretary of the National Conference of Bankruptcy Judges and a founding member and chair of the Judicial Insolvency Network. He also is the current chair of the Bankruptcy Judges Advisory Group established through the Administrative Office of the U.S. Courts, and was appointed to the FDIC’s Systemic Resolution Advisory Committee through May 1, 2021.

Judge Drain was an adjunct professor for several years at St. John’s University School of Law’s LL.M. in Bankruptcy Program and currently is an adjunct professor at Pace University School of Law. He has lectured and written on numerous bankruptcy-related topics and is the author of the novel The Great Work in the United States of America. He received his B.A. cum laude from Yale University and his J.D. from Columbia University School of Law, where he was a Harlan Fiske Stone Scholar for three years.