Navigating § 552: Pre-Petition Security Interests in Proceeds

Paul H. Zumbro is a partner in Cravath, Swaine & Moore LLP’s Corporate Department in New York and heads the firm’s Financial Restructuring & Reorganization practice. His practice focuses on restructuring transactions and related financings, both in and out of court, as well as on bankruptcy M&A transactions.

Mr. Zumbro’s practice includes advising the firm’s corporate clients on bankruptcy issues and advising on secured creditor rights in a variety of contexts. He regularly represents agents and arrangers in debt restructurings and debtor-in-possession (DIP) financings. His debt-restructuring experience also includes work in the fields of municipal and sovereign debt restructuring.

Mr. Zumbro is experienced in nondistressed leveraged finance, having represented the arranger banks in several multibillion-dollar LBO financings, including for Freescale Semiconductor, Neiman Marcus and Warner Chilcott. He also acts on the borrower side, representing sponsors and borrowers in acquisition and non-acquisition-related credit facilities. Mr. Zumbro has been recognized as a leading lawyer in banking and finance by Chambers USA: America’s Leadings Lawyers for Business in 2016 and 2017; The Legal 500 in 2009, 2012, 2013 and 2016; and in IFLR1000 from 2013-18. In 2017, he was named by Lawdragon as one of “500 Leading Lawyers in America.”

Mr. Zumbro received his B.A. cum laude and with distinction from Yale College in 1992 and his J.D. from Columbia Law School in 1997, where he was a Stone Scholar.

Robert J. Miller is a partner at Bryan Cave LLP in the firm’s Phoenix office, where his practice con-centrates on commercial workouts, chapter 11 restructurings, and all aspects of commercial bank-ruptcy litigation. His practice group is well-known for representing senior secured creditors. He also regularly represents debtors, operating trustees and buyers in distressed business situations.

Mr. Miller is a frequent lecturer and author on a wide range of commercial insolvency topics. He is a member of the American Bar Association, ABI and the Turnaround Management Association. Mr. Miller is a contributing editor to Norton Bankruptcy Law and Practice, as well as a number of other publications.

He received his B.S. from Central Michigan University, his M.B.A. from the University of Oklahoma and his J.D. summa cum laude from the University of Oklahoma College of Law.

Hon. Laurel M. Isicoff is Chief Judge for the U.S. Bankruptcy Court for the Southern District of Florida in Miami, initially appointed on Feb. 13, 2006, and named chief judge on Oct. 1, 2016. She also serves on ABI’s Board of Directors. Judge Isicoff is immediate past secretary, and currently serves as a director, of the National Conference of Bankruptcy Judges, and is also on the board of directors of CARE (Credit Abuse Resistance Education). She is a member of the Pro Bono Committee of the American College of Bankruptcy and chair of its Judicial Outreach Committee. She also currently serves as judicial chair of the Pro Bono Committee of the Business Law Section of the Florida Bar and is a member of the Florida Bar Standing Committee on Pro Bono.

Prior to her appointment to the bench, Judge Isicoff specialized in commercial bankruptcy, foreclosure and workout matters both as a transactional attorney and litigator for 14 years with the law firm of Kozyak Tropin & Throckmorton, after practicing for eight years with Squire, Sanders & Dempsey, now known as Squire Patton Boggs. She also developed a specialty in bankruptcy and SEC receiverships involving Ponzi schemes. After law school, Judge Isicoff clerked for
Hon. Daniel S. Pearson of the Florida Third District Court of Appeals before entering private practice.

She is a past president of the Bankruptcy Bar Association (BBA) of the Southern District of Florida and, until she took the bench, chaired its Pro Bono Task Force. Judge Isicoff speaks extensively on bankruptcy around the country, and is committed to increasing pro bono service, diversity in the bankruptcy community and financial literacy.

She received her J.D. from the University of Miami School of Law in 1982.