Bankruptcy Filer Keeps Personal Injury Claim

The recent Maryland Court of Appeals case of Morton v. Schlotzhauer involved a personal injury claim brought, at the last minute, by a woman who had filed bankruptcy and failed to list her personal injury claim as an asset. When this oversight was discovered, the opposing party sought to dismiss her case. This is because if a person does not list and exempt the asset, they no longer own it. The woman bringing the case was successful in getting the bankruptcy court to declare that the property belonged to her retroactively to the date she filed for bankruptcy. The Court of Appeals held that she had validly filed the personal injury case and could keep the money that, at one point, never belonged to her.