Janet M. Weiss

Janet M. Weiss is a partner in the Business Restructuring and Reorganization Practice Group of Gibson, Dunn & Crutcher's New York office.  Ms. Weiss has significant experience in all aspects of corporate reorganization and debt restructuring matters.  She has represented debtors, creditors, committees, secured lenders, debtor-in-possession financing lenders and acquirers in substantial chapter 11 cases and out-of-court restructurings.  She also has significant experience in all aspects of bankruptcy litigation and out-of-court restructurings, including corporate restructurings, pre-negotiated and pre-packaged bankruptcies and bankruptcy aspects of asset-backed and mortgage-backed financings.

Ms. Weiss has been named as one of the elite bankruptcy lawyers in New York in the August 2010 edition of Avenue Magazine and as one of the top ten lawyers for acquirers in bankruptcy acquisitions by The Deal's Bankruptcy Insider.

Ms. Weiss has represented the following companies in chapter 11 reorganization cases and out-of-court restructurings: 

• Hoop Holdings LLC, owner and operator of non-theme park Disney Stores, in chapter 11 case regarding sale of substantially all of its assets to The Walt Disney Company;
• International Power plc in the out-of-court restructuring of $879 million of debt of its operating subsidiary, American National Power, Inc.;
• The FINOVA Group Inc. and its affiliates, a financial services company, in their chapter 11 cases which restructured more than $10 billion of debt in a stand-alone plan, including obtaining a new $600 million loan to reorganized debtor by Warren Buffett's Berkshire Hathaway;
• MedicaLogic/Medscape and affiliates in their chapter 11 cases in which  the debtor sold all of its digital medical records assets to GE Medical Systems and sold its internet business to WebMD;
• Murray Energy Corporation in the out-of-court restructuring of its capital structure and issuance of new secured financing;
• National Gypsum Settlement Trust in its chapter 11 case, which implemented a $2.3 billion channeling injunction pursuant to Bankruptcy Code section 524(g) to satisfy the claims of asbestos claimants;
• Broadwing, Inc. and its board of directors in connection with the consideration of strategic alternatives relating to its complex out-of-court restructuring;
• Graham-Field Health Products, Inc. and affiliates in their chapter 11 cases, which reorganized this manufacturer and distributor of healthcare products, including the sale of a subsidiary to a third-party investor; and 
• Rexene Products Company and its affiliates, a plastics manufacturer, in their complex chapter 11 cases.

Ms. Weiss has represented both acquirers and sellers in acquisitions of troubled companies or their assets through the bankruptcy process, including:

• BCBG Max Azria in its successful bid for substantially all of the assets of G+G Retail, Inc.; 
• Gores Technology Group in its successful joint bid with Dixons Group plc to acquire the European businesses of Micro Warehouse, Inc. through a section 363 sale in Micro Warehouse's chapter 11 case;
• Amazon.com in its bid for the intellectual property assets of Tower.com;
• NAMCO, LLC in its bid for the intellectual property assets of Harrow Stores, Inc.;
• The Finish Line, Inc. in its $215 million bid for the assets of Footstar, Inc. in its chapter 11 bankruptcy case;
• NRG Energy, Inc. in its successful $1.2 billion acquisition of the non-nuclear assets from Cajun Electric Power Cooperative, Inc.'s chapter 11 case;
• ResMAE, Inc. as a chapter 11 debtor in the sale of substantially all of its assets;
• Tenet Healthcare Corporation in its successful acquisition of eight Philadelphia-area hospitals from the chapter 11 bankruptcy case of Allegheny Health Education and Research Foundation;
• a consortium of ChileSat, GVT and Roggio in a bid for the telecommunication operations of AT&T Latin America in its chapter 11 case;
• Lehman Brothers in its bid for assets from the chapter 11 case of Cable & Wireless USA;
• MedicaLogic/Medscape in the sale of its medical records business through a chapter 11 case to GE Medical Systems Information Technologies, Inc.; and
• Graham-Field Health Products, Inc. in the sale of its wholly owned subsidiary, Prism Enterprises, Inc.

Ms. Weiss has also represented numerous creditors in out-of-court restructurings and bankruptcy cases, including representation of Calyon in $11 billion restructuring of monoline insurer, CIFG, an internationally based consortium of owners of assets and equity holders in the Iridium chapter 11 case in New York, the Creditors' Committee in the UDC Homes, Inc. chapter 11 case in the District of Delaware, Cooper Industries, Inc. in connection with its asbestos issues arising from the chapter 11 cases of Federal Mogul, Inc. and its affiliates currently pending in the District of Delaware. 

Ms. Weiss has also represented secured creditors in the following chapter 11 cases: W.H. Hunt and N.B. Hunt personal bankruptcies, 1515 Broadway Associates and Olympia & York and represented secured creditors in the out-of-court resolutions for The Dallas Times Herald, the Emerson Radio bankruptcy and CCX, Inc. in a pre-packaged bankruptcy.

Prior to joining the firm, Ms. Weiss was an associate with Simpson Thacher & Bartlett in the creditors' rights and insolvency department.  She was educated at the University of Pennsylvania where she received her Juris Doctor in 1989 and a Bachelor of Arts degree cum laude in 1986.  She is admitted to practice before the state court of New York, the federal courts of the Southern and Eastern Districts of New York and the Third and Fifth Circuits.  Ms. Weiss co-authored "Lender's Path to Preserve Collateral Following section 365 Deemed Rejection," which appeared in the September 20, 2004 edition of the New York Law Journal and "Bankruptcy Code Amendments Give Landlords Greater Leverage," which appeared in the June 2007 edition of Retail Law Strategist.

Ms. Weiss presented her paper on “Issues Arising From the Cooperative Structure in Bankruptcies of Electric Power Cooperatives” at the Subcommittee on Bankruptcy Aspects of Business Transactions at the National Conference of Bankruptcy Judges.