Colorado football safety Shilo Sanders attended football preseason camp in Boulder this week with two big questions hanging over his head heading into his final college football season:
∎ He could help lead the Buffaloes to a bowl game after they fell short last year in Father Deion Sanders’ first season as Colorado coach?
∎ Will he be freed from the $11 million debt he owes a former Dallas security guard after declaring bankruptcy last October?
Both stories present high stakes for a player with NFL potential at 24 years old. But the answer to the second question — his debt — may come sooner than Sanders would like. Last week, lawyers for security guard John Darjean reaffirmed their case against him in a new court filing, arguing that Sanders should be held accountable for his alleged assault on Darjean in 2015, when Sanders was 15 years old.
“If Defendant (Sanders) is permitted to re-litigate this matter, then Defendant is creating a new legal loophole to avoid liability when someone assaults another,” the security guard’s lawyers wrote in bankruptcy court filings last week.
A federal bankruptcy judge could decide the issue in the coming months with a summary ruling that could blow up Sanders’ bankruptcy case and make him subject to debt collection efforts until he pays everything back. It’s a big pending decision in a perplexing case. Here’s the situation after last week’s new order:
The Effort to Pay Off Shilo Sanders’ Massive Debt
Sanders’ goal in filing a Chapter 7 bankruptcy case last year was to halt Darjean’s debt collection efforts and have the debt discharged by the court, allowing him to “start from scratch, free from the burden oppressive of his debts”, as his lawyers put it. they argued.
Typically, the bankruptcy court allows debts to be discharged as a way to provide relief to the “honest but unhappy debtor,” said Angela Littwin, a law professor and bankruptcy expert at the University of Texas.
But there are exceptions in the law that would prevent certain debts from being discharged. One of them is whether the debt arises from an “intentional and malicious injury on the part of the debtor”, as the security guard’s lawyers said. They said Shilo Sanders assaulted Darjean in 2015 when Darjean was trying to confiscate Sanders’ phone at school, leaving Darjean with permanent and serious spinal and nerve damage.
Darjean sued Sanders to recover for his damages in 2016, but when the case finally went to trial in Dallas in 2022, Sanders did not show up to defend himself in court. The court then considered the evidence and issued a default judgment that said Sanders owed Darjean $11.89 million, including $3 million for future physical disability and $2 million in loss of future earning capacity.
Darjean since promised to fight for what is owed to him and opposes debt discharge in bankruptcy court.
The question now is whether Sanders will be able to reconnect the 2015 incident. He disputed Darjean’s version of events, saying it was self-defense in response to Darjean’s assault. His lawyers also questioned whether Darjean’s injuries came from pre-existing conditions.
In last week’s court filing, Darjean’s lawyers argued that the law does not allow him to relitigate a case that has already been decided by another court, in this case the state court in Dallas.
What is the case against Shilo Sanders?
According to Darjean’s lawyers, the case is simple and should be decided quickly, without the need for a trial. They note that the law does not allow for discharge of debts arising from intentional and malicious injuries. The Texas state court has already ruled that “Shilo Sanders did in fact cause physical harm and injury to John Darjean by assaulting him,” according to the court’s findings. Therefore, they say he is barred from getting another try in court to contest the underlying 2015 incident.
Darjean’s lawyers also noted that Shilo Sanders defended himself against Darjean’s lawsuit for years before dismissing his lawyers in the case in 2020. He made counterclaims in the case, presented affirmative defenses and testified at a deposition.
“By participating in litigation leading up to trial and not appearing at trial, the defendant is absolving himself of liability for what amounts to a first-degree crime of aggravated assault,” Darjean’s attorneys said in court documents last week.
One outside legal observer found it baffling that Shilo Sanders would go to this point.
“He now faces every possible bad outcome in litigation,” said Mechele Dickerson, a law professor at the University of Texas. “He lost (in civil court), there is a ruling and he is (possibly) barred from raising certain defenses/claims or re-litigating decided issues. And because the judgment appears to involve intentional and malicious conduct, he may not be able to enforce it in his bankruptcy case.”
Why Shilo Sanders Wants to Avoid Summary Judgment
Darjean’s attorneys are seeking a summary judgment that “will determine that Plaintiff’s (Darjean) claim is exempt from discharge” under federal bankruptcy law.
If the judge agrees, Shilo would effectively lose his effort to pay off the debt and be on the hook for the $11 million, although he could appeal. If the judge does not agree with Darjean, the matter could proceed to trial, where the facts of the 2015 matter could be challenged in court.
“Typically, a non-discharge action based on alleged intentional and malicious injury is not resolved by summary judgment because there are facts in dispute,” said John Rao, senior attorney at the National Consumer Law Center in Boston. “However, the question in this case will be whether the bankruptcy judge will give any preclusive effect to the state court’s default judgment.”
That’s exactly what Darjean’s lawyers argued last week in his court filing. They said Sanders is “barred from re-litigating his counterclaims and defenses, in particular self-defense.” That’s because they said the issue has already been effectively decided by the Texas civil court. Under the doctrine of “collateral estoppel,” one party may preclude the other from re-litigating any issue that has been finally determined on the merits of a prior case in accordance with the Legal Information Institute.
“The exclusion covers all claims and defenses that Defendant (Sanders) had ample opportunity to argue in state court but chose not to do so,” Darjean’s attorneys wrote in the court filing. “Defendant also knowingly committed assault and aggravated battery as defined by the Texas Penal Code, as Plaintiff was a security officer who suffered serious bodily injury due to Defendant’s acts.”
What’s next in Sanders’ bankruptcy case?
Sanders’ attorneys argued that there is nothing in the Texas state court’s final ruling or its findings of fact that satisfies willful and malicious intent in this bankruptcy case, according to the court filing.
It is up to the judge to decide who is right, and there is no set deadline for when the judge will rule on summary judgment.
Darjean has two active complaints against Sanders that seek to prevent him from repaying his debt to him, including this one headed for summary judgment. The other complaint seeks to prevent a discharge based on other arguments, including that Shilo Sanders improperly concealed or omitted his assets in required bankruptcy disclosures.
That complaint is also pending, although Sanders is still trying to get parts of it dismissed after previously failing to get the entire complaint dismissed.
Sanders downplayed the overall situation in July at Big 12 Conference media days in Las Vegas.
“At the end of the day, everybody’s going to know the truth about everything, you know,” said Sanders, Colorado’s leading tackler last season.
Colorado opens the season Aug. 29 at home against North Dakota State.
Follow reporter Brent Schrotenboer @Schrotenboer. Email: bschrotenb@usatoday.com
This article originally appeared in USA TODAY: Deion Sanders’ son Shilo enters college season under legal cloud
