Ethics: Hold or Fold Them?

Kelly K. Roberts is a bankruptcy and business law attorney with Roberts Law, PLLC in Sarasota, Fla. In addition to representing businesses throughout the state, her practice includes representing consumer bankruptcy debtors in chapters 7 and chapter 13 cases, and creditors, guarantors and interested parties in all bankruptcy chapters and adversary proceedings.

Ms. Roberts previously practiced in Miami until 2018, at which time she relocated to Sarasota and opened her own firm. She is rated AV-Preeminent by Martindale-Hubbell, has been selected as a Florida Super Lawyers Rising Star in Consumer Bankruptcy for seven consecutive years, and was named a 2020 and 2021 SRQ Magazine Top Attorney in the area of Bankruptcy and Workout.

Ms. Roberts has served as a Florida Bar Business Law Section Fellow, a Barrister Member of the Judge John M. Scheb American Inn of Court, a director for the Florida Association of Women Lawyers’ Sarasota Chapter, and on the steering committee for the University of Miami Bankruptcy Skills Workshop, an annual continuing legal education program benefiting the Louis Phillips Scholarship Fund, which provides scholarships for law students interested in bankruptcy practice. She is currently leading a Florida Bar Business Law Section study group examining how the Florida’s exemption statutes compare to other states and whether modifications to the statutes would benefit Florida debtors and the administration of cases.

Ms. Roberts received her J.D. from the University of Miami School of Law in 2010.

Anerio V. Altman is the supervising bankruptcy attorney at Lake Forest Bankruptcy in Laguna Hills, Calif., and has been an attorney of record on more than 900 bankruptcy cases throughout California under chapters 7, 11 and 13. He has also appeared in numerous bankruptcy trials and contested matters in bankruptcy court and has appeared in four published cases as of December 2012.

Mr. Altman sits on the board of the Orange County Bar Association’s Commercial Law and Bankruptcy Section and on the Orange County Bankruptcy Forum. He also sits on the California Central District Rules Committee for the Bankruptcy Courts.

Mr. Altman was admitted to the Southern, Eastern and Northern Districts of California by 2005. He received his J.D. from Case Western University School of Law.

Hon. Laurel M. Isicoff is Chief Judge for the U.S. Bankruptcy Court for the Southern District of Florida in Miami, initially appointed on Feb. 13, 2006, and named chief judge on Oct. 1, 2016. She also serves on ABI’s Board of Directors. Judge Isicoff is president-elect of the National Conference of Bankruptcy Judges and an ABI Board member. She also is a member of the Pro Bono Committee of the American College of Bankruptcy, as well as chair of its Judicial Outreach Committee.

Judge Isicoff currently serves as judicial chair of the Pro Bono Committee of the Business Law Section of the Florida Bar and is a member of the Florida Bar Standing Committee on Pro Bono.

Prior to becoming a judge, she specialized in commercial bankruptcy, foreclosure and workout matters, both as a transactional attorney and litigator, for 14 years with the law firm of Kozyak Tropin & Throckmorton after practicing for eight years with Squire, Sanders & Dempsey, now known as Squire Patton Boggs. In private practice, she also developed a specialty in SEC receiverships involving Ponzi schemes.

After graduating from law school, Judge Isicoff clerked for Hon. Daniel S. Pearson at the Florida Third District Court of Appeal before entering private practice. She is a past president of the Bankruptcy Bar Association (BBA) of the Southern District of Florida and, until she took the bench, served as the chair of the Pro Bono Task Force for the BBA. Judge Isicoff speaks extensively on bankruptcy around the country, and is committed to increasing pro bono service, diversity in the bankruptcy community and financial literacy.

Judge Isicoff received her J.D. from the University of Miami School of Law in 1982.

Deborah L. Thorne is a judge for the United States bankruptcy court, Northern District of Illinois. She was appointed for a fourteen-year term beginning on October 22, 2015, and her current term will expire on October 21, 2029. Thorne was admitted to practice in Illinois in 1983.

Prior to her appointment, she was a partner at the Chicago office of Barnes & Thornburg LLP and a member of the Finance, Insolvency and Restructuring Department. Thorne focused her practice on the areas of bankruptcy, corporate restructuring, secured lending and insolvency law.

Judge Thorne attended Macalester College, where she earned her B.A. in 1975. She then earned her Master of Arts in Teaching degree from Duke University in 1976. She later earned her law degree from the Illinois Institute of Technology, Chicago Kent College of Law, graduating in 1983.