Gayle Killilea appeals US court’s ruling on asset recovery

The wife of bust property developer Sean Dunne has appealed a US court ruling last month that paved the way for her husband's Irish bankruptcy official to seek the recovery of assets transferred to her.

Gayle Killilea, the former newspaper gossip columnist, lodged a notice of appeal on Tuesday against the November 25th ruling of Connecticut Judge Alan Shiff in her husband's long-running bankruptcy appeal, according to newly filed US court records.

The judge, who has been presiding over Mr Dunne's case since he filed for bankruptcy in 2013, rejected Ms Killilea's attempt to block the work of Irish official assignee Chris Lehane after she claimed an automatic stay in the US protecting Mr Dunne was still in place.

‘Ineffective attempt’

Judge Shiff said that Ms Killilea’s application was “a thinly veiled and ineffective attempt” to shift away the attention of the Irish and US courts away from the mandates of the American bankruptcy code.

She was “employing a tactic which is frustrating and delaying the efficient and expeditious administration” of the US bankruptcy case and the Irish bankruptcy proceedings, he said in a 18-page ruling.

This is not the first time that the Dunnes have appealed a ruling of the Connecticut bankruptcy court to the District Court in the state, to where the couple relocated five years ago.

Mr Dunne lost his appeal against the bankruptcy court's June 2013 decision to permit Ulster Bank, one of his biggest creditors, to proceed with a legal action to have him adjudicated a bankrupt in Ireland.

The Co Carlow developer was declared a bankrupt in the Irish courts in July 2013, four months after voluntarily filing for bankruptcy in the US in an effort to circumvent the bank’s action in Ireland.