American Express Centurion Bank v. Allen (In re Allen)

528 B.R. 854
CourtUnited States Bankruptcy Court, N.D. Georgia
DecidedApril 1, 2015
DocketCase No. 13-52220-pwb; Adversary No. 13-5176-pwb
StatusPublished

This text of 528 B.R. 854 (American Express Centurion Bank v. Allen (In re Allen)) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering United States Bankruptcy Court, N.D. Georgia primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
American Express Centurion Bank v. Allen (In re Allen), 528 B.R. 854 (Ga. 2015).

Opinion

CONCLUSIONS OF LAW ON RESERVED ISSUE AND ORDER FOR ENTRY OF FINAL JUDGMENT

Paul W. Bonapfel, U.S. Bankruptcy Court Judge

Christy Nicole Allen filed a Chapter 7 petition on February 4, 2013. American Express Centurion Bank (“American Express”) timely filed a complaint for a determination that certain debts she incurred between July 16 and September 9, 2012, on a credit card it issued are excepted from discharge under 11 U.S.C.A. § 523(a)(2) because of her actual fraud.1

After a trial, the Court entered findings of fact and partial conclusions of law pursuant to Fed. R. Civ. P. 52(a), applicable under Fed. R. Bankr. P. 7052. [Docket No. 18; 2015 WL 459291 (Jan. 15, 2015) ]. Based on its analysis of the evidence, the Court made two factual findings. First, Ms. Allen intended to pay all of the debt she incurred. Second, she made charges of $7,974.45 during the four days (September 6-9) ending on the day (September 9) on which she knew that a minimum payment of $1,199.75 was due that she would not timely pay.

The Court concluded that all of the earlier charges were not excepted from discharge in view of her intent to pay them. The Court reserved ruling, however, on whether Ms. Allen had engaged in actual fraud by charging $7,974.45 in the four days preceding the due date of her minimum payment when she knew she would not make the minimum payment on that due date.

The Court phrased the legal issue this way: Does the holder of a credit card commit fraud when she incurs charges that she intends to pay but not in accordance with the terms that govern the use of the card? Put another way, the question is whether a cardholder commits actual fraud when she makes charges when she knows that she will be in default in a few days. [856]*856Having received briefs from the parties, the Court now addresses this remaining question of law.

The Eleventh Circuit addressed the question of the dischargeability of credit card debt under former § 17a(2) of the former Bankruptcy Act of 1898, as amended, in First National Bank of Mobile v. Roddenberry, 701 F.2d 927 (11th Cir.1983). Like § 523(a)(2) of the current Bankruptcy Code, enacted by the Bankruptcy Reform Act of 1978 as part of a comprehensive revision of the bankruptcy laws, former § 17a(2) provided an exception from discharge for a debt for obtaining money or property by false pretenses or false representations.

Applying the Fifth Circuit’s ruling in Davison-Paxon Co. v. Caldwell, 115 F.2d 189 (5th Cir.1940), cert. denied, 313 U.S. 564, 61 S.Ct. 841, 85 L.Ed. 1523 (1941), the Roddenberry court concluded that a credit card user does not obtain money or property by false pretenses or false representations unless and until the credit card issuer has “unequivocally and unconditionally revoked the right of the cardholder to further possession and use of the card, and until the cardholder is aware of this revocation.” Roddenberry, 701 F.2d at 932 (emphasis in original). The District Court for the Northern District of Georgia has applied the same analysis of false pretenses and false representations in the context of credit card debt under § 523(a)(2) of the Bankruptcy Code. Citibank (South Dakota), N.A. v. Kim, Civ. No. 1:02-CV-0314-J OF (slip opinion), 2003 U.S. Dist. Lexis 25566 (N.D. Ga. 2003). Accord, e.g., Chase Manhattan Bank, N.A. v. Ford (In re Ford), 186 B.R. 312, 317-20 (Bankr.N.D.Ga.1995); Chase Manhattan Bank (U.S.A.) v. Carpenter (In re Carpenter), 53 B.R. 724, 727-30 (Bankr.N.D.Ga.1985). See FDS National Bank v. Alam (In re Alam), 314 B.R. 834, 838-39 (Bankr.N.D.Ga.2004) (discussing Kim’s application of Roddenberry to § 523(a)).

Unlike former § 17a(2), current § 523(a)(2) provides an exception from discharge for debts for money or property obtained by “actual fraud.” As this Court explained in FDS National Bank v. Alam (In re Alam), 314 B.R. 834, 838-39 (Bankr. N.D.Ga.2004), a creditor cannot, under the principles of Roddenberry and Kim establish “actual fraud” based on the theory that the user of a credit card makes implied representations, with each use of the card, of the ability and intent to pay the debts thereby incurred. Id. at 839-40.

But the existence of a fraudulent misrepresentation is not necessary to an actual fraud claim under § 523(a)(2). As Alam observed, “actual fraud” is “a much broader term than false pretenses or false representation and may encompass ‘deceit, artifice, trick, or design involving direct and active operation of the mind, used to circumvent and cheat another.’ ” Alam, 314 B.R. at 840, quoting McCLellan v. Cantrell (In re Cantrell), 217 F.3d 890, 893 (7th Cir.2000).

The Alam court noted that the Seventh Circuit described fraud in McClellan as follows, id.:

Fraud is a generic term, which embraces all the multifarious means which human ingenuity can devise and which are resorted to by one individual to gain an advantage over another by false suggestions or by the suppression of truth. No definite and invariable rule can be laid down as a general proposition defining fraud, and it includes all reprise, trick, cunning, dissembling, and any unfair way by which another is cheated. Alam also noted that a debtor commits actual fraud when she “intentionally en[857]*857gages in a scheme to deprive or cheat another of property or a legal right.”

Alam, 314 B.R. at 841, quoting Mellon Bank, N.A. v. Vitanovich (In re Vitanovich), 259 B.R. 873, 877 (6th Cir. BAP 2001).

Under these principles, the Alam court concluded, “[A] debtor commits actual fraud for purposes of § 523(a)(2)(A) if the debtor uses a credit card without the actual, subjective intent to pay the debt thereby incurred.” Accord, e.g., In re Ford, 186 B.R. 312, 319-320 (Bankr.N.D.Ga.1995); In re Carpenter, 53 B.R. 724 (Bankr. N.D.Ga.1985).

The question here is whether fraud exists, notwithstanding a debtor’s actual subjective intent to pay a debt, when the debtor makes charges when she knows that she will not pay — and therefore, by definition, does not intend to pay — the debt in accordance with the terms of the credit agreement.

It is helpful to begin with a simple hypothetical. Suppose that a borrower seeks a loan from a lender who agrees to lend money only if the borrower promises to pay it back in 30 days. Suppose further that the borrower agrees to pay within 30 days but knows that she will not pay it back until 90 days later.

In this example, the borrower knows that she will not pay the debt when she promised. Presumably the lender would not agree to extend credit for 90 days, or in any event did not have the opportunity to decide whether it would agree to such a term. The borrower has, therefore, made a promise that she knows she will not keep. Under a broad reading of Alam,

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