The primary issue in this Chapter 7 bankruptcy case is whether the United States Bankruptcy Appellate Panel of the Tenth Circuit (BAP) had jurisdiction to review an “order for relief” entered by a bankruptcy judge serving in the United States Bankruptcy Court for the District of Delaware (Delaware Bankruptcy Court). The Delaware bankruptcy judge entered the order for relief after the effective date of a transfer of venue he had ordered under 28 U.S.C. § 1412 to the United States Bankruptcy Court for the District of Colorado (Colorado Bankruptcy Court).
The parties agreed that the order should be vacated on the ground that it is void because it was issued after the transfer was complete and therefore in the absence of jurisdiction, a proposition that finds footing in the case law of both the Third and Tenth Circuits. However, the Bankruptcy Appellate Panel (“BAP”) concluded that it did not have jurisdiction because the second sentence of 28 U.S.C. § 158(a) provides that an appeal of a decision by a bankruptcy judge “shall be taken only to the district court for the judicial district in which the bankruptcy judge is serving.”
Affirmed.
