John Hancock Abbott, Bankrupt v. The Regents of the University of California, Objection Creditor

We are asked in this appeal to reverse a decision of the district court which affirmed a determination of the bankruptcy judge that fraud precluded the discharge in bankruptcy of a student loan. The bankruptcy judge had given judgment in favor of the University Regents against the bankrupt. We affirm.

While a student at two state colleges in 1965 and 1966, Abbott obtained National Defense Student Loans totalling more than $5,000, all of which were discharged in bankruptcy in April 1967. About the same time, he executed a renewal note to one college, reaffirming the debt due it. Having transferred to the University of California at Berkeley, Abbott applied in June of 1967 for another loan from that institution for $9,000. He failed to list any of the previous loans in his application. The act authorizing such loans [ 20 U.S.C. § 425 (a)] provided that the total of all loans for all years to one person may not exceed $10,000.

Abbott’s second petition in bankruptcy was filed in 1972 and he listed the loan from the University of California. The University Regents objected to the discharge in bankruptcy, because of Abbott’s fraudulent concealment of the earlier loans from…