Third District Court of Appeal State of Florida Opinion filed January 13, 2021. Not final until disposition of timely filed motion for rehearing. ________________ No. 3D20-730 Lower Tribunal No. 15-23495 ________________ National Medical Imaging, LLC, et al., Appellants, vs. Lyon Financial Services, Inc., etc., Appellee. An Appeal from a non-final order from the Circuit Court for Miami-Dade County, Michael A. Hanzman, Judge. Genovese Joblove & Battista, P.A., and W. Barry Blum and Jessica Serell Erenbaum, for appellants. Shutts & Bowen LLP, and Jack C. McElroy, John W. Bustard and Patrick G. Brugger, for appellee. Before EMAS, C.J., and FERNANDEZ, LOGUE, SCALES, LINDSEY, HENDON, MILLER, GORDO, and LOBREE, JJ. SCALES, J. This Court, on its own motion, 1 rehears en banc National Medical Imaging, LLC v. Lyon Financial Services, Inc., 3D20-730, 2020 WL 5228979 (Fla. 3d DCA Sept. 2, 2020) (“panel opinion”). The panel opinion, in reliance upon Shop in the Grove, Ltd. v. Union Federal Savings & Loan Ass’n of Miami, 425 So. 2d 1138 (Fla. 3d DCA 1982), begrudgingly denied Appellee Lyon Financial Services, Inc. d/b/a U.S. Bank Portfolio Services’ August 14, 2020 motion to stay the proceedings in our Court (“stay motion”) during the pending bankruptcy proceedings in which Appellants National Medical Imaging, LLC and National Medical Imaging Holding Company, LLC are the debtors. Shop in the Grove held that the automatic stay provision in 11 U.S.C. § 362(a)(1) is inapplicable in this Court where the debtor – who is the defendant below and who has filed for federal bankruptcy protection – is the appellant. Shop in the Grove, Ltd., 425 So. 2d at 1139. Persuaded by (a) the clear and unambiguous text of the federal bankruptcy code’s automatic stay provision, (b) precedent from virtually every other jurisdiction to have addressed the issue, and (c) a slight nudge by the federal bankruptcy judge presiding over appellants’ bankruptcy case, we take this opportunity to, en banc, recede from Shop in the Grove (and, necessarily, the result reached in the panel opinion), and grant Appellee’s stay motion. 1 “A rehearing en banc may be ordered by a district court of appeal on its own motion or on motion of a party.” Fla. R. App. P. 9.331(d)(1). 2 I. RELEVANT BACKGROUND, THE PANEL OPINION, AND THIS COURT’S EN BANC CONSIDERATION In 2015, Appellee obtained a $12 million judgment against Appellants in a Pennsylvania state court. Appellee domesticated the judgment in the Miami-Dade County Circuit Court and obtained an April 28, 2020 final order below authorizing Appellee’s execution on certain choses in action owned by Appellants. On May 7, 2020, Appellants appealed this final order to our Court (appellate case number 3D20-730). After Appellants served their initial brief, Appellants, on June 12, 2020, filed voluntary Chapter 11 bankruptcy petitions in the United States Bankruptcy Court for the Eastern District of Pennsylvania (“Bankruptcy Court”). See In re: National Medical Imaging, LLC, Case No. 20-12618-elf (Bankr. E.D. Pa.) (consolidated). Not wanting to violate the automatic stay by filing an answer brief, or otherwise defending ...
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