The debtors’ Statement of Financial Affairs indicated that they were principals in nine corporations.

Some of the corporations were inactive, however, debtor, Mr. Vetri testified that he was unable to locate any of the business records of the corporations. He claimed that those records were either at his parents’ house in Sarasota, Florida, or his parents’ house in Pennsylvania, or the records may have been lost.

Title 11 U.S.C. Section 727, provides, in pertinent part, that:

(a) The Court shall grant the debtor a discharge unless . . .

(3) The debtor has concealed, destroyed, mutilated, falsified or failed to keep or preserve any recorded information, including books, documents, records and papers, from which the debtor’s financial condition or business transactions might be ascertained, unless such act or failure to act was justified under all the circumstances of the case….

Debtors’ failure to keep appropriate books and records from which their personal and business financial conditions and transactions might be ascertained resulted in the court denying their bankruptcy discharge. Meadowbrook Mall Company v. Michael and Joanne Vetri, 155 B.R. 782.

Author: Charles R. Harroun