Maybe for cases like this that involve literally millions of dollars, but it really helps normal people from becoming homeless if they fall on hard times for whatever reason.
Source: Family members went through bankruptcy in Florida and were able to get back on their feet much quicker because their house couldn't be seized.
Most states have a homestead exemption. But most states also have a limit on the value of that homestead.
Sure, you shouldn't lose your reasonable family home over debt. But that doesn't mean people like OJ Simpson should be able to keep their multi million dollar estates even though they have filed for bankruptcy.
It's a little more complicated than that and it's also $100k for married couples and goes up if you are elderly.
In order for a creditor to take a lien on your home after a bankruptcy proceeding in CA, I believe they need to prove that after a Sheriff's sale (which generally does not get market value), there will be more than the exemption limit left over after all the mortgage and taxes and fees are paid.
If they can't then they won't be able to levy your home and force a sale. So in a worst case scenario, you would need to take out an additional mortgage or heloc on the available equity in your home to bring the total available equity under the exemption limit ($75k+) and then pay that money towards the bankruptcy debt.
So basically what is happening, is you get to keep your home, but you are forfeiting all you home owner's equity that exceeds the exemption limit.
And even in this case. Does Anthony Levandowski deserve to become homeless and destitute for what he did? No.
This is going to hurt him far, far more than what he did could ever have hurt Google. Yeah, maybe Google would have lost more than this on paper, but definitely not in terms of marginal utility. Google remains an extremely wealthy and powerful company and now Anthony is broke.
Fraud? What? This trial hasn’t even gone to court. You’re making blanket statements about someone’s life based on accusations from a Big Tech company and their PR teams. This person has been accused -not convicted and is going bankrupt because he is fighting Google. I know this is a Bay Area forum - half of you probably work for Google but give me a break. They steal personal information from everyone who uses their products every single day. They buy up an competition - they don’t play fair. They are the largest advertising company in the world - let’s not pretend like they’re more than that. Or they are some virtuous company that wouldn’t personally go after someone who is a threat to them and working with a competitor. Destroying others so theirs is positioned to raise 2 Billion dollars. This guy just got caught in the crossfire. This is just parroting headlines.
Ah, the American "ooga booga" defense. You can never really know anything, since everything is speculation! This is just lawyer-speak!
There is moral hazard written all over this, and you are either too naive to see it or are trying to defend the stacked kangaroo courts of American criminal proceedings for employees of large multinational corporations.
We know that the guy stole proprietary technology and maybe there might have been intentions to use it by Uber, BUT there's no proof tying it to Uber (of course). As always. These guys aren't dumb enough to make the mistakes that Microsoft made in the 90's.
Remember you may be able to claim an exemption on your $5m estate but you need to pay the taxes and electric bill and it’s hard to do that when up to 75% of anything you make beyond minimum wage is garnished (I don’t think any state even allows this much but maybe). To be fair some states only allow up to 25%. And some states you cannot garnish at all, you can only levy bank accounts
