Bankruptcy Case No. 11-42304.United States Bankruptcy Court, E.D. Michigan, Southerndivision — Detroit.
April 20, 2011
ORDER FOR EXTENSION OF TIME FOR THE CHAPTER 7 TRUSTEE ONLY TO FILE OBJECTIONS TO THE DEBTORS’ DISCHARGE, BUT DENYING TRUSTEE’S REQUEST FOR EXTENSION OF THE DEADLINE TO OBJECT TO DEBTORS’ CLAIMED EXEMPTIONS
THOMAS TUCKER, Bankruptcy Judge
This case is before the Court on the stipulation filed on April 19, 2011 between the Chapter 7 Trustee, Michael A. Stevenson, and the Debtors, Donnie Lee Carner and Susan D. Carner (Docket # 15, the “Stipulation”). In the Stipulation, these parties agree that the deadline for the Chapter 7 trustee to object to the debtor’s exemptions and the debtor’s discharge each be extended to June 18, 2011 (which, the Court notes, is a Saturday.)
The Trustee’s request for an extension of the deadline for objecting to the Debtors’ discharge is timely, and will be granted. But the Trustee’s request for an extension of his deadline to object to the Debtors’ exemptions is untimely under Fed.R.Bankr.P. 4003(b)(1), and must be denied.
Under Fed.R.Bankr.P. 4003(b)(1), the deadline to file an objection to a debtor’s exemptions is “30 days after the meeting of creditors held under § 341 is concluded or within 30 days after any amendment to the list or supplemental schedules is filed, whichever is later.” The § 341 meeting concluded on March 10, 2011. Debtors have not filed any amendments to their original list of exemptions or any supplemental schedules. Therefore, the deadline for filing objections to Debtor’s exemptions was April 11, 2011.
In order for the Court to extend the time for any party to object to a debtor’s exemptions, that party must file a motion to extend the deadline before the deadline has expired. Fed.R.Bankr.P. 4003(b) states: “The court may, for cause, extend the time for filing
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objections [to a debtor’s claim of exemptions] if, before the time to object expires, a party in interest files a request for an extension.” Fed.R.Bankr.P. 9006(b)(3), in turn, provides, in relevant part, that “[t]he court may enlarge the time for taking action under Rules . . . 4003(b), . . . only to the extent and under the conditions stated in those rules.”
In this case, no motion or stipulation to extend the deadline to object to Debtors’ claim of exemptions was filed before the deadline expired. Therefore, the Court does not have authority to extend the deadline. See, e.g., In re Lufkin, 256 B.R. 876, 880
(Bankr. E.D. Tenn. 2000).
Accordingly,
IT IS ORDERED that the deadline to file objections to the Debtors’ discharge under 11 U.S.C. § 727 is extended to June 20, 2011, for the Chapter 7 Trustee only.
IT IS FURTHER ORDERED that the Trustee’s request for an extension of the deadline to object to Debtors’ claimed exemptions is denied.