In re Liljeberg Enterprises, Inc.
| Decision Date | 28 August 2002 |
| Docket Number | No. 00-30645.,00-30645. |
| Parties | In the Matter of: LILJEBERG ENTERPRISES, INC., Debtor. Lifemark Hospitals, Inc., Appellant-Cross-Appellee, v. Liljeberg Enterprises, Inc., Appellee-Cross-Appellant, Liljeberg Enterprises, Inc., Appellee-Cross-Appellant, v. Lifemark Hospitals, Inc., Appellant-Cross-Appellee, Lifemark Hospitals, Inc., Appellant-Cross-Appellee, v. St. Jude Hospital of Kenner, Louisiana, L.L.C., Appellee-Cross-Appellant, Liljeberg Enterprises, Inc., Appellee-Cross-Appellant, v. Lifemark Hospitals of Louisiana, Inc.; Lifemark Hospitals, Inc.; American Medical International; Tenent Healthcare Corporation, Appellants-Cross-Appellees. |
| Court | U.S. Court of Appeals — Fifth Circuit |
Joseph N. Mole, Frilot, Partridge, Kohnke & Clements, New Orleans, LA, Nina Cortell (argued), Sharon N. Freytag, Haynes & Boone, Dallas, TX, for Appellants-Cross-Appellees.
Sidney Katherine Powell (argued), Powell & Reggio, Dallas, TX, Deborah Pearce Reggio, Powell & Reggio, New Orleans, LA, for Appellees-Cross-Appellants.
Appeals from the United States District Court for the Eastern District of Louisiana.
Before PATRICK E. HIGGINBOTHAM, DeMOSS and BENAVIDES, Circuit Judges.
This appeal brings to us three of four consolidated actions arising from a failed relationship formed to build and manage a hospital and medical office building in Kenner, Louisiana, the latest round in the parties' protracted litigation.
Following a bench trial of the consolidated cases, the district court overturned a judicial sale of the hospital, reinstated various contracts which defined the financing and lease of the hospital, and denied the holder of the hospital mortgage a claim for a deficiency judgment. The court also ruled that, under a Clinical Pharmacy Management Agreement governing the operation of the hospital pharmacy and the flow of drugs to the hospital, Liljeberg Enterprises, Inc., the hospital pharmacy operator and principal supplier of drugs to the hospital, was due almost $12.5 million and the hospital operators and principal purchasers of the drugs for the hospital were owed $741,879.
In Chapter 11 proceedings, the district court conditionally granted the debtor Liljeberg Enterprises, Inc.'s request to assume the Clinical Pharmacy Management Agreement as an executory contract pursuant to 11 U.S.C. § 365.1
We reverse the district court's judgment setting aside the judicial foreclosure of the hospital and declining to award the deficiency due on the mortgage debt, we reverse the district court's order allowing the debtor in the Chapter 11 proceedings to assume the pharmacy agreement, and finally we affirm in part and reverse in part the various awards made under the pharmacy agreement.
First, the dramatis personae. The four consolidated actions involve Lifemark Hospitals of Louisiana, Inc., Lifemark Hospitals, Inc., American Medical International, and Tenet Healthcare Corporation on one side,2 and Liljeberg Enterprises, Inc. ("Liljeberg Enterprises") and St. Jude Hospital of Kenner, La., L.L.C. ("St.Jude") (collectively the "Liljebergs") on the other.
Liljeberg Enterprises is a corporation whose sole shareholders are John Liljeberg and his brother Robert Liljeberg, both licensed pharmacists. The Liljebergs, through Liljeberg Enterprises, formed a series of corporations and a partnership to own or operate a medical complex consisting of a hospital, a hospital pharmacy, and a medical office building. St. Jude, a wholly-owned subsidiary of Liljeberg Enterprises, owned the St. Jude Hospital ("hospital"), which is now known as Kenner Regional Medical Center. St. Jude Medical Office Building, Ltd. Partnership ("St. Jude Limited Partnership"), of which St. Jude was the general partner, owned the adjacent medical office building. Funding for that building came from Travelers Insurance Company, a loan of $25 million on October 10, 1985, secured by a mortgage on the medical office building and an assignment to Travelers of rents to be paid on leased spaces in the building.
Lifemark Hospitals, Inc. was a national hospital management company that provided financing to St. Jude to build the hospital. Lifemark Hospitals of Louisiana, Inc., a wholly owned subsidiary of Lifemark Hospitals, Inc., entered into an agreement with St. Jude to lease and operate the hospital. American Medical acquired Lifemark Hospitals, Inc. in 1984, and Tenet became the successor to American Medical in 1995.
On August 26, 1981, the Liljebergs obtained a "certificate of need" under Section 1122 of the Social Security Act to build and operate a 300-bed acute care facility in the New Orleans area.3 This Section 1122 certificate was the only one available in the New Orleans area and the last one to be granted in Louisiana. Lacking the money to build a hospital, the Liljebergs immediately solicited participation by many companies, including Health Services Acquisition Corporation. The Liljebergs' negotiations with Health Services extended over several months before disintegrating into heated litigation.4 The Liljebergs began their discussions with Lifemark in the latter part of 1981, under the shadow of the approaching deadline under the Section 1122 certificate of need.
In their negotiations with Lifemark, John Liljeberg was assisted by a team of two attorneys, one of whom was a CPA, an economist, and two pharmacy consultants. John Liljeberg insisted from the outset that, as part of any deal, the Liljebergs had to be given a contract to provide pharmaceutical services to the hospital. On December 21, 1982, the parties signed a letter of intent setting forth the principal terms of their agreement.
The final documents were executed in early 1983, including: (1) a loan agreement, wherein Lifemark Hospitals, Inc. agreed to provide financing of over $44 million to St. Jude for construction of the hospital; (2) a promissory note signed by St. Jude and made payable to Lifemark Hospitals, Inc.; (3) a collateral mortgage, a collateral mortgage note, and a pledge of the collateral mortgage note, all signed by St. Jude to secure the note to Lifemark Hospitals, Inc.; (4) a lease agreement wherein Lifemark Hospitals of Louisiana, Inc. agreed to lease and operate the hospital from St. Jude; and (5) the Clinical Pharmacy Management Agreement ("pharmacy agreement"), signed by Liljeberg Enterprises and Lifemark Hospitals of Louisiana, Inc., wherein Liljeberg Enterprises agreed to provide pharmaceutical services to the hospital. Additionally, the Liljebergs received a cash payment of $2.5 million as called for by the letter of intent.
These agreements were intertwined in at least two ways: (1) St. Jude's note payments and Lifemark's lease payments were offsetting transactions so that their monthly payment was only a bookkeeping entry;5 and (2) the pharmacy agreement contained a cross-default provision.
A dispute arose between Lifemark and St. Jude over the financing and project management involved in the construction of the hospital. That dispute was settled by written agreement in 1991 after arbitration. As part of the settlement, St. Jude executed a renewal note, renewing and extending the original note. Like the original note, the renewal note was secured by the original collateral mortgage, collateral mortgage note, and pledge of collateral mortgage note. To further secure the renewal note, St. Jude executed a "Collateral Assignment of Basic Rent" ("collateral assignment of rents"), which was recorded, providing Lifemark Hospitals, Inc. a secured interest in rents in the event of a future default by St. Jude.
The hospital, hospital pharmacy, and medical office building became operational in 1985. By March of 1990, St. Jude Limited Partnership had defaulted on its Travelers loan and, in June 1990, Travelers sued St. Jude Limited Partnership and other defendants. The suit, seeking seizure and sale by judicial process of the medical office building, was successful, and the building was sold at public auction on October 18, 1991 to Travelers, the sole bidder.
More protracted litigation ensued, in the course of which a panel of this court commented that the conduct of the Liljebergs constituted "as egregious and unconscionable of bad faith contractual dealings as the members of this panel can recall having encountered."6 Travelers obtained an amended judgment in December 1992 awarding Travelers both unpaid rents and damages from St. Jude Limited Partnership based on, inter alia, a jury verdict finding waste committed by the Liljebergs with respect to the collateral in the medical office building securing the repayment of Travelers's loan to St. Jude Limited Partnership for the construction of the building. When efforts to collect the amended judgment against the partnership failed, Travelers filed a separate action against St. Jude, the general partner of St. Jude Limited Partnership, in which Travelers obtained a summary judgment on July 30, 1993, which this Court affirmed.7
On August 12, 1993, Travelers secured a lien on the hospital by filing its $7.8 million judgment against St. Jude. The Travelers lien primed Lifemark's collateral mortgage because Lifemark had not at that time reinscribed its lien.8 Lifemark reinscribed its collateral mortgage on June 29, 1994.
Within the same time frame, on January 27, 1993, within one month after Travelers obtained its $7.8 million judgment, Liljeberg Enterprises filed for bankruptcy protection. In the course of these bankruptcy proceedings, Liljeberg Enterprises as the debtor in possession, sought the federal district court's permission to assume, that is, continue to operate under, the pharmacy agreement, pursuant to 11 U.S.C. §§ 365 and 1107. Shortly thereafter, on August 11, 1993, within one month after...
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