Consumer Bankruptcy Legal Update 2020

Jeffrey S. Ainsworth is an attorney with BransonLaw PLLC in Orlando, Fla., where he practices primarily in the areas of bankruptcy, creditors’ rights and dischargeability issues, and has represented individual debtors, corporate debtors, unsecured creditors, committees, secured creditors and trustees. He is a member of ABI, the Orange County Bar Association and the Central Florida Bankruptcy Law Association.

Mr. Ainsworth is admitted to practice in all Florida courts and the U.S. District Courts for the Northern, Middle and Southern Districts of Florida. He received his B.A. in political science in 2004 from the University of Central Florida and his J.D. in 2008 from Florida State University, where he also received a Certificate in Environmental and Land Use Law.

Dennis J. LeVine is a partner in the Tampa, Fla., office of Kelley Kronenberg, where he represents creditors in bankruptcy, handles commercial and consumer collection litigation throughout Florida, and advises clients on vehicle towing, storage and repair liens. He is one of only seven attorneys in Florida to be Board Certified in both Consumer Bankruptcy Law and Business Bankruptcy Law by the American Board of Certification (ABC).

Prior to joining the firm, Mr. LeVine was founder and president of Dennis LeVine & Associates, P.A. in Tampa for 19 years where he primarily represented creditors and chapter 7 trustees in all bankruptcy courts and creditors in commercial and consumer collection actions. He is licensed to practice in the federal courts in the Northern, Middle and Southern Districts of Florida.

Mr. LeVine is a past president of the Tampa Bay Bankruptcy Bar Association and an active member of ABI, for which he served on its Board of Directors, and the Florida Bar’s Business Law Section. He has published numerous articles on consumer bankruptcy law in the ABI Journal, the Florida Bar Journal, the ABI Consumer Bankruptcy Committee e-newsletter and The Cramdown, the monthly publication of the Tampa Bay Bankruptcy Bar Association. He has also been a guest speaker on bankruptcy and collection law throughout the U.S. Mr. LeVine is the Florida editor for the annual West Exemption Manual.

Mr. LeVine received his undergraduate degree from Tulane University, where he was elected Phi Beta Kappa, and his J.D. from George Washington University’s National Law Center.

Hon. Caryl E. Delano is Chief Bankruptcy Judge for the U.S. Bankruptcy Court for the Middle District of Florida in Tampa, initially appointed on June 25, 2008, and named Chief Judge on October 1, 2019. She also was appointed Presiding Judge of the Fort Myers Division in July 2012.

Previously, Judge Delano practiced before the bankruptcy courts of the Central District of California for 14 years. In 1994, she returned to Tampa and most recently practiced law with the firm of Addison & Delano, P.A., where she concentrated her practice on bankruptcy and commercial litigation. Judge Delano has represented debtors and creditors in numerous chapter 11 cases and related adversary proceedings. She is a member of the Florida Bar, the State Bar of California, the National Conference of Bankruptcy Judges, ABI, the Business Law Section of The Florida Bar (Executive Council, CLE Committee), the Hillsborough County Bar Association and the Tampa Bay Bankruptcy Bar Association.

In addition, she serves as the liaison judge to the Middle District of Florida’s Local Rules Lawyers’ Advisory Committee and is a member of the National Conference of Bankruptcy Judges Federal Rules Advisory Committee. In 2017, Judge Delano received the Southwest Florida Bankruptcy Professionals Association’s Alexander L. Paskay Professionalism Award. In addition, she is the former executive director and past-president of the J. Clifford Cheatwood American Inn of Court.

Judge Delano received her B.A. in English cum laude in 1976 from the University of South Florida and her J.D. in 1979 from Indiana University School of Law, having completed her final year of law school at Emory University School of Law.