The Ponzi Book: A Legal Resource for Unraveling Ponzi Schemes

Kathy Bazoian Phelps is a partner at the law firm of Raines Feldman LLP in the firm’s Los Angeles office. She obtained her undergraduate degree from Pomona College in 1988, and her law degree from the University of California at Los Angeles in 1991. She was admitted to the California Bar in 1991. She represents trustees and receivers, debtors, secured and unsecured creditors, and creditors' committees in bankruptcy cases and has extensive litigation experience representing both plaintiffs and defendants in a wide variety of bankruptcy litigation matters. She frequently represents operating and liquidating trustees in cases pending in the United States Bankruptcy Court as well as receivers in the United States District Court and the Superior Court of the State of California. Kathy has also served as a court-appointed receiver in cases initiated by the Securities Exchange Commission and the Commodities Futures Trading Association. She is recognized by peers for her ability to trace and recover assets in large-scale complex cases and for her familiarity with all issues arising in Ponzi cases. She has developed a specialty in representing bankruptcy trustees and receivers in litigation involving fraudulent activities and has been lead counsel in large-scale litigation involving recovery of assets in Ponzi scheme cases. She is currently the editor of Receivership News. She is also a member of the Board of Directors and secretary of the National Association of Federal Equity Receivers; a member of the Los Angeles/Orange County Council of the California Receivers' Forum; and a member of American Bankruptcy Institute, Los Angeles Bankruptcy Forum, Los Angeles County Bar Association, and the Armenian Bar Association. She has lectured widely and written on bankruptcy and receivership matters for, among other organizations, the American Bankruptcy Institute, the National Association of Bankruptcy Trustees, the Association of Insolvency and Restructuring Accountants, the International Association for Asset Recovery, and the American Bar Association. Kathy also serves as a mediator and is currently on the mediation and arbitration rosters for the Financial Industry Regulatory Authority, as well as the Bankruptcy Mediation Panel for the Central District of California and the Bankruptcy Mediation Panel for the District of Arizona.

Some of her other publications include:

•  Ponzi-Proof Your Investments: An Investor’s Guide to Avoiding Ponzi Schemes and Other Fraudulent Scams (IRR Publishing 2013)

•  Fraud and Forensics: Piercing Through the Deception in a Commercial Fraud Case, co-author (American Bankruptcy Institute 2015)

•  The Depths Of Deepening Insolvency: Damage Exposure For Officers, Directors and Others, co-authored with Prof. Jack F. Williams (American Bankruptcy Institute 2013)

•  Author of The Ponzi Scheme Blog at www.theponzischemeblog.com

•  In Pari Delicto: Solutions to an Inequity Plaguing Bankruptcy Trustees and Innocent Creditors, co-author, published in Norton Annual Survey of Bankruptcy Law (West 2015)

•  Equity Receivers and the In Pari Delicto Defense, published by the American Bar Association in the May 2014 volume of The Business Lawyer

•  Handling Claims in Ponzi Scheme Bankruptcy and Receivership Cases, 42 Golden Gate U. L. Rev. 567 (2012)

•  What Do You Do When the Feds Come For Your Assets? Third-Party Claims in Forfeiture Proceedings, American Bar Association Business Law Section's Online Resource, Business Law Today (June 21, 2012)

•  Liability of Professionals and Insiders in Ponzi Schemes, 27 CEB Cal. Bus. L. Prac. 22 (Winter 2012)

•  Emergence of Mareva by Letter: Banks' Liability to Non-Customer Victims of Fraud, Business Law International, Vol. 12 No. 2 (May 2011)

Judge Steven Rhodes has been a United States Bankruptcy Judge in the Eastern District of Michigan since 1985, serving in Detroit. He was chief judge of the court from 2002-2009. He has served two terms on the Bankruptcy Appellate Panel of the Sixth Circuit, 1997-2004 and 2008-2011. He was also chief judge of the Bankruptcy Appellate Panel from 2002-2004.

Before his service as bankruptcy judge, he was a United States Magistrate in the Eastern District of Michigan from 1981-1985. Before that, he was in private practice (1977-1981) and served as an Assistant United States Attorney (1974-1977). He was also a law clerk to the Honorable John Feikens, United States District Judge for the Eastern District of Michigan (1973-1974).

His undergraduate degree is from Purdue University in Mechanical Engineering in 1970 and his law degree is from the University of Michigan Law School in 1972. In law school, he served as an editor of the Michigan Law Review. He was an adjunct professor at the University of Michigan Law School from 1992-2003, teaching bankruptcy law, and at the University of Detroit Law School in 1986, teaching ethics.

From 1994-1996, he was an Associate Editor for the American Bankruptcy Law Journal, published by the National Conference of Bankruptcy Judges. In 1995, he was inducted as a fellow of the American College of Bankruptcy. From 2002 to 2004, he served as Chair of the National Conference of Bankruptcy Judges Endowment for Education. From 2005 to 2009, he was Vice President for Research of the American Bankruptcy Institute and on its Executive Committee. On April 3, 2009, the ABI awarded him its 2009 Distinguished Service Award. He is currently serving on the Board of Governors of the National Conference of Bankruptcy Judges and on the Judicial Council of Sixth Circuit.

His publications include The Ethical Obligations of a Chapter 7 Trustee, 80 AM. BANKR. L.J. 147 (2006);A Preview of "Demonstrating a Serious Problem with Undisclosed Assets in Chapters 7 Cases," 2002 No. 5 (May) Norton Bankr. L. Advisor 1; An Empirical Study of Consumer Bankruptcy Papers, 73 AM. BANKR. L.J. 653 (Summer 1999); Eight Statutory Causes of Delay and Expense in Chapter 11 Cases, 67 AM. BANKR. L.J. 287 (Summer 1993).

He has spoken at numerous conferences and seminars on bankruptcy law and practice sponsored by the Federal Judicial Center, the National Association of Bankruptcy Judges, the National Association of Bankruptcy Trustees, the National Association of Chapter Thirteen Trustees, the American Bankruptcy Institute, the American Bar Association, the Commercial Law League, the Turnaround Managers Association, the Association of Insolvency and Restructuring Accountants, the United States Trustee Program, the Byrne Judicial Clerkship Institute at Pepperdine Law School, the Michigan Institute for Continuing Legal Education and several other state and local bar organizations.