Thomas W. Halm, Jr. is a partner  in the Creditors’ Rights/Bankruptcy Department and a member of its Litigation Division, in the Princeton, New Jersey office of Hill Wallack LLP.

Representative Clients

Mr. Halm represents clients in both state and federal courts in bankruptcy, insolvency, and other creditors’ rights matters. His clients include secured and unsecured creditors, financial institutions, hedge funds, creditors’ committees, commercial landlords, asset purchasers, trustees, receivers and equipment lessors.

For example, he has represented: 

• Lending institutions such as Sovereign Bank, Investors Savings Bank, Amboy Bank, Sun National Bank, Bank of Oklahoma, and TD Bank, N.A.
• Commercial landlords such as Heller Industrial Parks, Stanbery Development and Cheesequake Commons, LLC
• His work for lenders involves workouts and asset sales, including drafting forbearance and/or modification agreements, loan sale agreements, and asset purchase agreements, and defending lender liability claims, including RESPA, TILA, FDCPA, consumer fraud, and other claims
• State court appointed receivers in securities fraud, state/federal civil RICO, fraudulent conveyance, preferential transfer, professional liability, negligence, and other claims

Representative Matters

Clients count on Mr. Halm to represent them in matters such as those summarized below:

• He has served as Receiver for James Hankins, Jr., The Hankins Group, Ltd., Hankins Private Client Group, LLC, and Hankins Life Settlement LLC in a multimillion-dollar securities fraud case brought by the New Jersey Bureau of Securities before the Superior Court of New Jersey, Chancery Division, General Equity Part, Monmouth County. He is responsible for winding up the affairs of the corporate defendants and locating and liquidating all assets of the defendants for distribution to the defrauded investors and creditors. In this capacity, he has liquidated the minimal assets left in the estate including a mansion and its contents in Palm Beach County, Florida; resolved a dispute with the receivership entities’ commercial landlord and auctioned off the contents of the entities’ office; located secreted assets and liquidated same; and instituted legal actions resulting in the recovery of nearly $600,000.00 to date for the receivership estate.
• Mr. Halm has represented a national warehouse operator in all phases of a Chapter 11 bankruptcy filing by a multi national tenant, including but not limited to assisting the client with respect to the Debtor’s rejection of the commercial lease, the filing of proofs of claims, including an administrative claim for post-petition damage to the client’s real property, and defending the client in preference/fraudulent conveyance litigation.
• He has represented a hedge fund in obtaining payment in full, including all attorneys’ fees and costs, on a loan secured by a private golf course, including instituting foreclosure proceedings and obtaining the appointment of a receiver for the property and the profits generated therefrom, and pursuing the client’s claim in the Debtor’s subsequent Chapter 11 bankruptcy filing by obtaining the appointment of a Chapter 11 trustee based on the Debtor’s previous fraud.
• Mr. Halm has represented a state chartered bank in defense of allegations that the bank violated the New Jersey Consumer Fraud Act by entering into a workout arrangement with its Borrower that interfered with the Borrower’s obligation to refund a membership deposit owed to a founding member of a private country club.
• He has represented a nationally chartered bank in the foreclosure of nearly $30 million in cross-defaulted/cross-collateralized loans and equipment leases secured on six hotels and a catering hall, including the early termination of a Swap Agreement and the appointment of a receiver for the property and the profits generated there from.
• He has represented a private lending group as lead lender in resolving a defaulted loan obligation secured on a catering facility, parking lot, and investment properties. This matter involved negotiating a forbearance and modification agreement resulting in the transfer of title by deed in lieu of foreclosure, the execution of leases by the Borrower for the continued use of various property, and the eventual liquidation of said assets by the sale of same, including the negotiation of an asset sale agreement whereby the client sold its paper and the remaining assets of the Borrower to a participant in the loan.

Leadership

Mr. Halm is active in the professional and civic communities in which he works and lives. His positions include:

• Robbinsville Township Board of Education, member and chair of the Negotiations Committee
• Robbinsville Education Foundation, Trustee and Treasurer
• Collier Golf Classic Committee (benefiting Collier Youth Services), member
• Turnaround Management Association, member
• National Association of Industrial Office Parks, member
• American Bankruptcy Institute, member
• New Jersey State Bar Association, member
• Robbinsville Township Planning Board, former member (2005-2006)
• Robert Wood Johnson University Hospital – Hamilton Young Professionals Group, former member (2006-2009);

In 2006 and 2007, Mr. Halm was recognized by New Jersey Super Lawyers as a Rising Star in the field of bankruptcy law. Mr. Halm is admitted to practice law in the State of New Jersey and the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania. Following law school, Mr. Halm served as a judicial law clerk to the Honorable James P. Courtney, Jr., Superior Court of New Jersey, Law Division, Ocean County. An honors graduate of Seton Hall University, Mr. Halm received his law degree from Seton Hall University School of Law.