Law and legal issues

A court-appointed receiver will oversee the operations of the troubled nonprofit that operates Connecticut's flagship replica slave vessel Amistad.

Fitch Ratings said Detroit's offer to holders of $5.2 billion of water and sewer bonds to tender their debt as part of a bankruptcy settlement does not constitute a distressed debt exchange, an analysis that could bode well for ratings the planned refinancing of the debt.

Detroit has asked the federal judge in charge of its Chapter 9 to consider forcing bond insurer Syncora Guarantee to issue an apology for suggesting that federal mediators have tainted the bankruptcy process.

Detroit Public Schools will move forward with a plan to issue $111 million of state aid notes as well as an updated deficit elimination plan that calls for 10% pay cuts and the closure of up to 24 schools.

A group of ratepayers from a Chicago suburb are suing five advisors and consultants, accusing them of misrepresenting the value of participation in the bond-financed Prairie State Energy Campus to the city of Batavia.

A state fee on so-called "small tobacco" companies that were not part of a 1998 settlement with states' attorneys general is unconstitutional, a Texas appeals court ruled.

Bond insurer Syncora Guarantee challenged Detroit's settlement with its unlimited-tax general obligation bondholders in court Tuesday, arguing that it means Detroiters will continue to pay taxes on a levy that they did not approve on the original ballot.

As Detroit gears up for a key trial on its bankruptcy exit plan next week, a long-simmering dispute over $1.4 billion of certificates of participation is just starting to heat up.

Ratepayers from a Chicago suburb will file a lawsuit as soon as Tuesday seeking compensation for steep energy rate hikes they've paid due to cost overruns at the bond-financed Prairie State Energy Campus coal-fired power plant.

The felony indictment of Texas Gov. Rick Perry covers actions he took against the Travis County District Attorney's office while its investigators looked into grants to his campaign contributors from a $3 billion cancer research bond fund.

San Bernardino has reached a tentative agreement with its police union just two months after it struck an agreement with the California Public Employee's Retirement System.

The Puerto Rico Electric Power Authority put off a day of reckoning in an agreement with creditors announced Thursday, but still may be headed for what would be the largest municipal bond default in U.S. history.

The Detroit City Council has approved a series of four bond issues that include nearly $1 billion of new limited-tax GO bonds to help finance unsecured creditor settlements as part of its bankruptcy plan.

The Puerto Rico Electric Power Authority announced agreements with insurers and bondholders controlling more than 60% of PREPA's outstanding bonds to amend existing bond documents to provide PREPA with liquidity and for PREPA to appoint a chief restructuring officer.

Detroit Bankruptcy Judge Steven Rhodes pushed back the start date of a trial on the city's confirmation plan by eight days to Aug. 29, noting that the city's plan to reach a settlement with its water and sewer bondholders will likely result in a newly amended confirmation plan.

The Detroit Council unanimously approved emergency manager Kevyn Orr's plan to refinance up to $5.5 billion of water and sewer bonds to help resolve the city's bankruptcy.

A group of bondholders trying to recoup their investment in a failed Moberly, Mo. artificial sweetener plant has added as a defendant Raymond James Financial Inc. — which acquired the bond deal's underwriter and lawsuit's original target.

The largest teachers' union in Kansas is seeking to overturn provisions in the state appropriations law that strips tenured teachers of their rights to appeal firings.

Detroit asked the bankruptcy court to approve financing deals that would allow it to refinance up to $5.5 billion of water and sewer debt, providing the first glimpse of settlement details with the bondholders in the court request.

Syncora Guarantee Inc. is targeting the federal mediators who crafted the main settlement at the heart of Detroit's bankruptcy exit plan, arguing that they showed illegal and politically motivated bias toward pensioners and saving the city's art.