Raso v. Fahey (In re Fahey)
Raso v. Fahey (In re Fahey)
Opinion of the Court
MEMORANDUM OF DECISION
I. INTRODUCTION
The matter before the Court is the Complaint filed by the plaintiff, Charles Raso (the “Plaintiff’) against the defendant, James M. Fahey (the “Debtor”), in which he seeks a determination that certain contributions owed to an employee benefit plan are nondischargeable pursuant to 11 U.S.C. § 523(a)(4). On May 14, 2012, I granted summary judgment to the Debtor, concluding that although the plan satisfied the requirement of a technical trust, the Debtor was not a fiduciary.
II. BACKGROUND
The Massachusetts Bricklayers and Masons Health and Welfare Fund, Pension Fund, and Annuity Fund (collectively, the “Funds”) are three multi-employer employee benefit plans, as defined in 29 U.S.C. §§ 1002(3) and (37).
Zani Tile Co., Inc. (“Zani”) was a business located in Watertown, Massachusetts, of which the Debtor was the president, treasurer, and sole shareholder until the business ceased operating in August, 2010.
Zani was timely in its payment of Deductions and Contributions until November 2008, at which time payments became consistently late.
On September 23, 2011, the Plaintiff filed a complaint against the Debtor and Zani in the United States District Court for the District of Massachusetts, seeking damages for the unpaid Deductions and Contributions.
The Debtor filed his voluntary Chapter 7 petition on January 21, 2011.
On May 14, 2012, I issued a Memorandum of Decision with respect to the motion for summary judgment.
On November 20, 2012, the Panel issued a decision in which it concluded that I
On remand, I entered a pre-trial order and directed the parties to file a joint pretrial statement in advance of trial, setting forth any agreed facts. On February 13, 2013, the parties filed the PTS, in which they agreed to a determination of this adversary proceeding on stipulated facts.
III. POSITIONS OF THE PARTIES
A. The Plaintiff
The Plaintiff argues that the Debtor’s failure to pay Contributions was a defalcation within the meaning of 11 U.S.C. § 523(a)(4) because as a fiduciary of the Funds, the Debtor owed a duty of loyalty that required him to act in the Funds’ best interest and not engage in “self-dealing and self-preservation.”
B. The Debtor
The Debtor contends that his failure to pay the Contributions is a mere “breach of contract for which [the Debtor] cannot be found to have been guilty of fraud or defalcation.”
Section 523(a)(4) of the Bankruptcy Code excepts from discharge debts for “defalcation while acting in a fiduciary capacity....”
The exact meaning of “defalcation” as it is used in 11 U.S.C. § 523(a)(4) has long confounded the courts. As explained by the Supreme Court in Bullock:
Congress first included the term “defalcation” as an exception to discharge in a federal bankruptcy statute in 1867. See [Rutanen v. Baylis (In re Baylis), 313 F.3d 9, 17 (1st Cir. 2002) ]. And legal authorities have disagreed about its meaning almost ever since. Dictionary definitions of “defalcation” are not particularly helpful. On the one hand, a law dictionary in use in 1867 defines the word “defalcation” as “the act of a defaulter,” which, in turn, it defines broadly as one “who is deficient in his accounts, or fails in making his accounts correct.” 1 J. Bouvier, Law Dictionary 387, 388 (4th ed. 1852). See also 4 Oxford English Dictionary 369 (2d ed. 1989) (quoting an 1846 definition that defines the term as “ ‘a breach of trust by one who has charge or management of money’ ”). Modern dictionaries contain similarly broad definitional language. Black’s Law Dictionary, for example, defines “defalcation” first as “Embezzlement,” but, second, as “[l]oosely, the failure to meet an obligation; a nonfraudulent default.” Black’s Law Dictionary 479 (9th ed. 2009) (hereinafter Black’s). See also American Heritage Dictionary 474 (5th ed. 2011) (“To misuse funds; embezzle”); 4 Oxford English Dictionary, supra, at 369 (“monetary deficiency through breach of trust by one who has the management or charge of funds; a fraudulent deficiency in money matters”); Webster’s New International Dictionary 686 (2d ed. 1954) (“An abstraction or misappropriation of money by one, esp. an officer or agent, having it in trust”); Webster’s Third New International Dictionary 590 (1986) (“misappropriation of money in one’s keeping”).49
Analyzing their precedent with respect to the interpretation of the “fraud” portion of 11 U.S.C. § 523(a)(4), the Supreme Court held that defalcation
includes a culpable state of mind requirement akin to that which accompanies application of the other terms in the same statutory phrase. We describe that state of mind as one involving knowledge of, or gross recklessness in respect to, the improper nature of the*22 relevant fiduciary behavior.50
The Supreme Court went on to explain:
Thus, where the conduct at issue does not involve bad faith, moral turpitude, or other immoral conduct, the term requires an intentional wrong. We include as intentional not only conduct that the fiduciary knows is improper but also reckless conduct of the kind that the criminal law often treats as the equivalent. Thus, we include reckless conduct of the kind set forth in the Model Penal Code. Where actual knowledge of wrongdoing is lacking, we consider conduct as equivalent if the fiduciary “consciously disregards” (or is willfully blind to) “a substantial and unjustifiable risk” that his conduct will turn out to violate a fiduciary duty. ALI, Model Penal Code § 2.02(2)(c), p. 226 (1985). See id., § 2.02 Comment 9, at 248 (explaining that the Model Penal Code’s definition of “knowledge” was designed to include “ hvilful blindness’ ”). That risk “must be of such a nature and degree that, considering the nature and purpose of the actor’s conduct and the circumstances known to him, its disregard involves a gross deviation from the standard of conduct that a law-abiding person would observe in the actor’s situation.” Id., § 2.02(2)(e), at 226 (emphasis added). Cf. Ernst & Ernst v. Hochfelder, 425 U.S. 185, 194, n. 12, 96 S.Ct. 1375, 47 L.Ed.2d 668 (1976) (defining scienter for securities law purposes as “a mental state embracing intent to deceive, manipulate, or defraud”).51
In closing, the Supreme Court noted that this standard is similar to that set forth by the United States Court of Appeals for the First Circuit in In re Baylis and adopted by the United States Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit in In re Hyman.
Pursuant to 29 U.S.C. § 1104, an ERISA fiduciary “shall discharge his duties with respect to a plan solely in the interest of the participants and beneficiaries ...”
Defalcation may be presumed from breach of the duty of loyalty, the duty not to act in the fiduciary’s own interest when that interest comes or may come into conflict with the beneficiaries’ interest:
A trustee occupies a position in which the courts have fixed a very high and very strict standard for his conduct whenever his personal interest comes or may come into conflict with his duty to the beneficiaries. As long as he is not acting in his own interest the standard fixed for his behavior is only that of a reasonable degree of care, skill, and caution. But when the trustee acts in his own interest in connection with the performance of his duties as trustee, the standard of behavior becomes more rigorous. In*23 such a case his interest must yield to that of the beneficiaries.
2A [A. Scott, The Law of Trusts] § 170.25 [ (W.F. Fratcher ed., 4th ed. 2001)]. As with the other fault-based exceptions, fault may be presumed from the circumstances, here a violation of the duty of loyalty.55
Under the Trust Agreements, unpaid contributions that were due and owing were assets of the Funds. The Debtor does not dispute that he was aware of his obligations to the Funds, but nonetheless failed to remit the assets. Instead, the undisputed facts indicate that the Debtor prioritized the payment of corporate expenses that were beneficial to him, such as the Citizens Bank loan which he personally guaranteed and his personal loan to Zani, over his obligations to the Funds.
Having already satisfied the other elements of 11 U.S.C. § 523(a)(4), the Plaintiff is entitled to judgment as a matter of law that the Contributions are nondis-chargeable.
V. CONCLUSION
In light of the foregoing, I will enter judgment in favor of the Plaintiff.
. Raso v. Fahey (In re Fahey), 470 B.R. 649 (Bankr.D.Mass. 2012), rev'd, 482 B.R. 678 (1st Cir. BAP 2012).
. Raso v. Fahey (In re Fahey), 482 B.R. 678, 696 (1st Cir. BAP 2012).
. PTS, Docket No. 57 at ¶ 5.
. Id. at ¶ 4.
.Id. at ¶ 3.
. Id. at ¶ 1.
. Id. at ¶¶ 16, 25.
. Id. at ¶¶ 16-17.
. Id. at ¶¶ 6-7.
. Mali 9.
. Id. at ¶ 7.
. Raso Affidavit, Docket No. 18, Exhibits 1-3 at § 1.15. See PTS, Docket No. 57 at ¶¶ 8, 15.
. PTS, Docket No. 57 at ¶¶ 31-32.
. Td. at Mill, 18
. Id. at ¶ 12.
. Raso Affidavit, Docket No. 18 at ¶ 15.
. PTS, Docket No. 57 at ¶ 19.
. Id. at ¶ 21.
. Id. at ¶ 23.
. Id.
. Id. at ¶¶ 22, 24.
. Id. at ¶ 13.
. Raso Affidavit, Docket No. 18 at ¶ 17 and Exhibit 5.
. PTS, Docket No. 57 at ¶ 30.
. Id. at ¶ 25.
. Id. at ¶ 26.
. Id. at ¶ 27.
. Chapter 7 Voluntary Petition, Docket No. 1, Case No. 11-10505-WCH.
. Memorandum of Law in Opposition to the Motion for Summary Judgment ("Opposition Memorandum”), Docket No. 29 at 3.
. In re Fahey, 470 B.R. at 649.
. Id. at 656.
. Id. at 658.
. Id. at 659.
. In re Fahey, 482 B.R. at 692-694.
. Id. at 695.
. Id. at 696.
. PTS, Docket No. 57 at ¶ III.
. Bullock v. BankChampaign, N.A., - U.S. -, 133 S.Ct. 1754, 185 L.Ed.2d 922 (2013).
. Memorandum in Support of Motion for Summary Judgment, Docket No. 17 at 11.
. Id.
. Id. at 10 (citing Rutanen v. Baylis (In re Baylis), 313 F.3d 9, 18-19 (1st Cir. 2002)).
. See Mass. Gen. Laws ch. 109A, § 6(b); Mass. Gen. Laws ch. 151 D, § 11.
. Opposition Memorandum, Docket No. 29 at 6.
. Id, at p. 7-9 (quoting In re Baylis, 313 F.3d at 20-23).
. 11 U.S.C. § 523(a)(4).
. Grogan v. Garner, 498 U.S. 279, 286, 111 S.Ct. 654, 112 L.Ed.2d 755 (1991).
. M-R Sullivan Mfg. Co. v. Sullivan (In re Sullivan), 217 B.R. 670, 675 (Bankr.D.Mass. 1998).
. Chao v. Duncan (In re Duncan), 331 B.R. 70, 77 (Bankr.E.D.N.Y. 2005).
. Bullock v. BankChampaign, N.A., 133 S.Ct. at 1758.
. Id. at 1757.
. Id. at 1759-1760.
. Id. at 1761 (citing In re Baylis, 313 F.3d at 9; Denton v. Hyman (In re Hyman), 502 F.3d 61, 69 (2d Cir. 2007)).
. 29 U.S.C. § 1104(a)(1).
. Pension Benefit Guar. Corp. v. Solmsen, 671 F.Supp. 938, 946 (E.D.N.Y. 1987).
. In re Baylis, 313 F.3d at 20-21.
. Although the Plaintiff contends that Zani’s weekly payments to the Debtor were wages, it is ultimately irrelevant as either demonstrate that the Debtor was putting himself ahead of the Funds.
Reference
- Full Case Name
- In re James M. FAHEY, Jr., Debtor. Charles Raso v. James M. Fahey, Jr.
- Cited By
- 4 cases
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- Published