MWI Bankruptcy Mediation & Arbitration Program Overview

As the premier provider of alternative dispute resolution services to the bankruptcy community, MWI’s Bankruptcy ADR panel combine expertise in dispute resolution with wide experience in bankruptcy practice.

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Types of Cases

Our bankruptcy mediators and arbitrators have practiced in bankruptcy in all types of cases and have participated in discovery, negotiation and trial of all manner of bankruptcy disputes.  They are experts in seeing the issues and bringing a case to a mutually beneficial resolution.  As such, MWI bankruptcy mediators can be used in any type of adversary proceedings or contested matters, including:

• Preference Cases
• Derivatives
• Mortgage Modifications
• Fraudulent Transfer Cases
• Consumer Protection Actions
• Collection and Turnover Actions
• Claim Objections
• Dischargeability Matters
• Motions for Relief
• Validity of Lien Proceedings
• Contract and Lease Disputes
• Objections to Exemptions
• Plan Issues


Panel Bios

Jack Esher has represented lenders, trustees, creditors’ committees, business debtors and sophisticated consumer debtors in bankruptcy cases for over 25 years. He has also served as a mediator and arbitrator in bankruptcy and commercial matters for more than 20 years. Mr. Esher was a member of the distinguished panel of mediators and arbitrators at JAMS, a firm internationally recognized in the field of ADR, for ten years. He then helped to establish the National Bankruptcy Panel at Mediation Works Incorporated (MWI), which has recently expanded to become a leader in providing ADR services to the bankruptcy community. At MWI, Mr. Esher continues his pioneering advocacy for the use of ADR techniques in bankruptcy proceedings. He is co-author of the acclaimed American Bankruptcy Institute publication: The ABI Guide to Bankruptcy Mediation (2nd ed. 2009), and serves on the Register of Mediators for the Delaware Bankruptcy Court. Mr. Esher has been a member of the American Bankruptcy Institute for over twenty years, and was the Founding Chair of the ADR Committee of the ABI, serving in that position from 1994 to 2001. Mr. Esher is a frequent lecturer on bankruptcy and ADR topics. He has conducted mediation trainings for judges, attorneys and business leaders in the United States and in Thailand. Along with the ABI Guide, his authored works include Arbitration and Judicial Discretion: Circuits Are Split (Norton Bankruptcy Law Adviser, May 2006); Claim Resolution Facilities (ABA, 2003); How to Succeed in Mediation Without Trying…Your Case (ABI, 2002); Valuing and Selling Intellectual Property (ABI, 2000); The Structured Negotiation Process, (ABI, 1999); and Chapter 36, Alternative Dispute Resolution in Bankruptcy Practice (J.Esher & R. Tilton), Chapter 11 Theory and Practice (LRP Publications, 1998, 2001). Mr. Esher holds a B.A. in Sociology from Brandeis University and a J. D. from the University of San Francisco School of Law, magna cum laude. Representative cases include:

• In re Consolidated Food Products, mediation of preference proceedings, Delaware;
• In re Dura Automotive, mediation of numerous preference proceedings, Delaware;
• In re Gretag, Mediation of multi-million dollar lien avoidance case, Massachusetts
• In re Fleming, Preference Facility Mediator, Delaware;
• In re Jamesway, Claims Facility Mediator, New York;
• In re Rich’s Department Stores, Claims Facility Arbitrator; Massachusetts;
• In re Malden Mills, Mediation of multi-party contract/insurance dispute, Massachusetts
• In re ACT Manufacturing, Mediation of multi-party dispute arising from sale of assets and involving a class of employees, Massachusetts.


Howard Gorney combines over thirty years as a bankruptcy and commercial attorney with mediation and arbitration skills to assist parties in reaching resolution in bankruptcy and bankruptcy-related disputes. Mr. Gorney is a member of the Mediation Panels of the U. S Bankruptcy Courts for the District of Delaware and for the Southern District of New York. He is also a member of the Arbitration Panels of the National Association of Securities Dealers, the National Arbitration Forum, and the State of Massachusetts Office of Consumer Affairs and Business Regulation. In addition, Mr. Gorney serves on the MWI mediation and arbitration panels for the resolution of franchise contractual disputes with General Motors Corp. BMW of North America and Saturn Corp. A partner and senior counsel at Nixon Peabody LLP for over 18 years, Mr. Gorney served as chair of its Commercial Law Department. A lecturer and author of many articles on bankruptcy and commercial law, Mr. Gorney received a Bachelor’s Degree from the Univ. of Vermont, a Master’s Degree from the Univ. of Pennsylvania and a J. D. from Suffolk Univ. Law School. He is admitted to the Bar in Massachusetts, the United States District Court for the District of Massachusetts, the First Circuit Court of Appeals and the United States Supreme Court. Mr. Gorney has been a member of the American Bankruptcy Institute for over 15 years and serves on ABI’s Committee on Alternative Dispute Resolution. Mr. Gorney has mediated many bankruptcy disputes, including the following:

• In re Gentek, Inc, Delaware;
• In re BRAC Group, Inc., Delaware;
• In re Oakwood Homes, Delaware


Jane Juliano’s litigation practice spans a wide array of civil disputes involving contracts, tax, securities, real estate and tort. Since devoting her practice to dispute resolution in 1993, she has mediated and arbitrated over 500 complex commercial disputes. Jane is also a former Trial Attorney in the Tax Division of the US Department of Justice. In the latter capacity, Ms. Juliano handled numerous bankruptcy matters: represented the IRS in reorganization and liquidation cases; litigated priority of liens among real, personal and intangible personal property claims; litigated dischargeability of debt cases; and litigated claim disputes. At the government level, she has mediated and arbitrated issues with the U.S. Dept of Commerce, U.S. Marshals Service, Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms, Library of Congress and the U.S. Dept of Education. Ms. Juliano is a former panel member of JAMS and the American Arbitration Association. Ms. Juliano is an appointed mediator with the District of Columbia and Virginia Courts, the World Bank, the Federal Election Commission and Arbitrator, U.S. Library of Congress Copyright Royalty Arbitration Panel. Representative cases include:

• Restructuring of a large title insurance company;
• Arbitration of multiple claims filed by African American farmers against the U.S. Department of Agriculture in Pigford, et al. v. Glickman, USDC, DC;
• Arbitration of$11 million acquisition financing dispute between Fortune 50 company and a corporation.

Ms. Juliano has been a Visiting Scholar at Harvard Law School and the Program on Negotiation. She holds a BA in Psychology from the U. of Colorado, with distinction, a J. D. from Georgetown Law School, cum laude, and a Masters in Theological Studies from the Harvard School of Divinity and a Mid-Career Master in Public Administration from the Harvard Kennedy School, where she conducted research about how religion and culture affects negotiation behavior. She also teaches mediation at Georgetown Law School and is a Visiting Clinical Mediator at Harvard Law School.


Francis Conrad Prior to joining MWI’s Bankruptcy Mediation Panel, Mr. Conrad served as a United States Bankruptcy Appellate Panel Judge for the District of Vermont, 1996-1999, and as a United States Bankruptcy Judge for the District of Vermont, 1985-1999. In that capacity, he planned, ordered and implemented ADR and claims procedures to resolve hundreds of thousands of asbestos claims and personal injury claims in bankruptcy. He also served as mediator in adversary proceedings involving complex tax and contractual issues, including breach of contract. He presided over numerous insolvency and reorganization cases covering a wide range of industries and businesses including: manufacturing, news and entertainment media, healthcare, investment banking, brokerage, insurance, banking, retail and shipping and leasing. Mr. Conrad assisted in the formation of the ADR program for the Southern District of New York and is a member of the court’s ADR panel. In the Eastern District of New York, Mr. Conrad worked with Judges to implement ADR and he has served as a panel member for the ICC International Court of Arbitration. He is the author of numerous publications including Bankruptcy Litigation, a chapter in the treatise Bankruptcy Tax Issues Under the Code Changes (2001). In 2005, he co-authored Cross Border Bankruptcy Update: Do United States Bankruptcy Courts Have the Final Say. He also served as a contributing editor for a bankruptcy treatise from 1994 until 2004.


John G. Wofford has extensive experience in financial issues, including banking, bankruptcy, business, contract and investment products disputes. He has performed only neutral roles since 1987, has been in solo practice since 1993, and has been on MWI’s commercial mediation panel for over 10 years. He has provided resolution services in over 500 matters. Before beginning his own practice, he was also a government official in federal and state governments - Deputy General Counsel, US Department of Transportation; and Associate Commissioner, Massachusetts Department of Public Works. He is a graduate of Harvard College, Harvard Law School, and Oxford University, where he was a Rhodes Scholar. He is a member of the bars of New York, Massachusetts and the District of Columbia (DC inactive).

His experience includes:

• Banking: Mediations involving alleged liability for losses in complex financial products in Savings & Loan failures (FDIC/Resolution Trust issues); lender liability (to contractor for failure to communicate pending collapse of developer; to developer for refusing to finance development as the market fell; to owner for alleged wrongful foreclosure); issues concerning professional liability of bank’s officer/lawyer for alleged illegal loans;

• Business Workouts: Mediation of disputes between business and professional partners, and between managers and key employees, with results ranging from staying together to separation and business sale or dissolution. Issues have included bankruptcy; stock and other asset valuation and disposition; buy/sell agreements; debt and capital contribution allocation; performance standards and assessment; alleged wrongful termination of employment; conflicts involving ownership and/or employment status and responsibilities; workouts, and secured payment plans over time. Served as arbitrator in multi-million dollar dispute between real estate joint venture partners;

• Contracts: Mediations involving interpretation of contracts, labor union requirements, franchise agreements, fees for service, commissions, employment, representations regarding asset valuation and sale of business, claimed exclusivity of agency, consumer fraud. Value of contracts from $10,000 to $30 million;

• Foreclosure/Bankruptcy: Trained in mediation of foreclosure issues in Federal Bankruptcy Court cases, conducted by Real Estate Bar Association of Massachusetts;

• Investment Products Class Action Issues: Arbitrator for claims brought by policy holders in settlement process for class action against John Hancock Life Insurance Company for alleged deceptive practices in complex investment and insurance products.


George M Kelakos has over 27 years of experience in the insolvency field as an attorney and adviser. He is the founder and Managing Director of Kelakos Advisors LLC, a distressed M&A and transaction advisory firm that provides Asia-focused cross-border and IP buy and sell-side advisory services, as well as mediation services. Recently, he also served as a Chapter 11 Trustee in a case pending in the Southern District of New York in which the principal assets were joint venture interests in PRC companies that own and operate large copper and steel facilities in Shandong Province, PRC. Mr. Kelakos’s current cross-border projects include in and out-bound Chinese and Thai projects. Prior to the formation of his advisory practice in 2006, Mr. Kelakos was Of Counsel to Heller Ehrman, LLP as a member of the Bankruptcy, Corporate Finance and International practice groups. Currently, Mr. Kelakos practices law as Of Counsel to Salans, an international law firm, where he concentrates his efforts on cross-border matters, with a particular emphasis on Asia. He has over 12 years of experience working on matters relating to Southeast Asia and Greater China. Mr. Kelakos began to focus on ADR in 1997 and, since 1998, Mr. Kelakos has assisted the government of the Kingdom of Thailand and the ASEAN Secretariat on matters relating to bankruptcy law reform and the development and promotion of Western-style ADR practices and procedures. The public-side efforts included chairing and leading knowledge transfer and capacity-building projects in Thailand and for ASEAN member-states in connection with training over 750 local mediators in Western-style mediation techniques as well as standardizing forms and procedures for court-assisted mediation projects. On the private sector side, from 2000 to 2002, He also served as the Managing Director of Tonson Planners Ltd., a Bangkok-based consulting firm that provided consulting and advisory services to clients involved in commercial and real estate loan work-outs and Thai business reorganization and debt restructuring cases; during that time, Mr. Kelakos was also qualified and listed as an approved mediator for the Corporate Debt Restructuring and Advisory Committee of the Bank of Thailand. A frequent international and national speaker on programs involving cross-border, alternative dispute resolution and IP monetization topics, he is a Founding Member of the International Insolvency Institute and serves as Co-Chair of that organization's Asian Developments Committee. He has also served as the Vice President of International Affairs of the American Bankruptcy Institute, as a member of the Executive Committee of the Board of Directors of the ABI from April 2005-2007 and on the Board of the ABI through April of 2009. Mr. Kelakos is fluent in French and Italian, conversant in Hebrew and Thai, and is studying Mandarin. Mr. Kelakos holds a B.A. from Brandeis University, cum laude, and a J.D. from the University of Denver College of Law. He is admitted to the Bar in CO, N Y, MA, U.S. Court of Appeals, Tenth Circuit; U.S. District Court, District of CO, U.S. District Court, and District of MA.



Scope of Services

Mediation:  We encourage attorneys, trustees, debtors in possession and plan administrators to utilize our mediation services. Mediation is a voluntary process designed to resolve disputes efficiently and fairly, costing the parties substantially less than if they were to engage in extensive discovery and go to trial.  MWI is dedicated to bringing parties together to settle disputes. We have a wealth of experience in dispute resolution and deliver reliable, quality service attuned to the needs and interests of our clients.


Contact

For more information, including fees, please call Nancy Connelly, Director of Commercial Programs at 800-348-4888 x25 or nconnelly@mwi.org or fill out the form below for more information or to schedule a session.
 

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