The legality of terminating the proceedings on a complaint against the actions of the manager: what will the Supreme Court decide?
In May 2023, Smartavia lawyers complained in court about the actions of the arbitration manager and demanded that he recover 800,000 rubles in losses caused by the unjustified involvement of a lawyer and payment for his services.
The court of first instance, which was later partially accepted by the appeal, included's claim in the register. However, in June, the District Court overturned these acts, sending the dispute to the first instance for a new trial.
After that, the court of first instance, which was later accepted by the appeal and cassation, citing that the airline did not have the status of a bankruptcy creditor, terminated the proceedings on Smartavia's complaint against the actions of the bankruptcy trustee and the application for recovery from him.
The Supreme Court was scheduled to consider the case after Smartavia's complaint on June 3, 2024 (case A40-244390/2019).
Tatiana Kolodkina, Senior Associate in the Corporate Law and Bankruptcy Practice at Versus.Legal, reviewed the courts' arguments at the request of the ProBankruptcy portal. Tatyana believes that lower courts reasonably did not suspend the proceedings on Smartavia's complaint: “The proceedings can be suspended if the court has cases whose claims are related to the grounds for their occurrence and/or evidence presented, and there is a risk of adopting contradictory judicial decisions. Meanwhile, there is no competition between judicial acts on separate disputes over the inclusion of AK Smartavia's claim in the register of creditors' claims and appeal against the manager's actions. The annulment of judicial decisions on this basis is unlikely.” You can learn more about the case on the ProBankruptcy portal at the link.