CRE Borrower and Guarantor Defenses: Attempts to Stop the Receiver, the UCC Sale, and the Personal Judgment

Lauren earned her JD from Rutgers University School of Law-Newark in 2003 and her BS in Communications/Public Relations from Boston University in 2000. She is admitted in New York and New Jersey and before the US Bankruptcy Courts for the District of New Jersey and the Eastern and Southern Districts of New York, and the US Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit. She served as a law clerk to the Honorable Novalyn L. Winfield, United States Bankruptcy Judge for the District of New Jersey.

Lauren is a Recognized Lawyer in The Legal 500 for Restructuring (including Bankruptcy): Corporate in 2022 and 2025, and was named to Crain’s New York Business’ 2021 Notable Women in Law list. Her work on behalf of Heywood Healthcare received the Turnaround Management Association’s 2025 Non-Profit Company Turnaround/Transaction of the Year Award. She serves as a member of the capital markets opinion committee for bankruptcy matters.

Lauren is a Fellow of INSOL International and a member of the International Association of Restructuring, Insolvency and Bankruptcy Professionals (INSOL). She was a panelist on “Trends in the Leveraged Loan Sector: The Rise of Chapter 11 Filings in the High Yield and Leveraged Loan Market” at IMN’s ABS East Virtual 2020, and has co-authored articles in the American Bankruptcy Institute Journal, including “Material Adverse Effect Clauses are Enforceable in Delaware” (March 2019), “Does the Second Circuit in Sabine Have the Final Word on Texas Law?” (August 2018), “Merit: Safe-Harbored No More?” (April 2018), and “A Momentive Performance: Second Circuit Sets Interest Rate Standard and Denies Make Whole in Momentive Cramdown Plan” (January 2018). She is a board member of the Animation Project, a nonprofit serving at-risk youth.

Lauren’s lender-side matters include representing a mezzanine lender in the foreclosure of a premier New York hotel, a DIP lender in the bankruptcy of a New York-based construction project, and a real estate investment firm in the purchase of a New York area boutique hotel and apartment building, where she assisted in drafting and confirming a creditor plan following a credit bid and took a lead role in successfully defending an appeal of the confirmation order to the District Court. She has represented a syndicate of lenders in the workout of a rail car credit facility, lenders in battery storage, cogeneration, and NYC PACE energy-efficiency project financings, and bidders for hotels in the Eagle Hospitality portfolio under section 363 of the Bankruptcy Code. On the debtor side, she served as counsel to First Guaranty Mortgage Corporation, a mortgage originator in Chapter 11 in the District of Delaware, where she negotiated and obtained approval of two DIP facilities, and to Verity Health System in the second largest Chapter 11 hospital bankruptcy in American history, which involved the marketing and sale of six hospitals and $185 million in debtor-in-possession financing. She has represented official committees of unsecured creditors in Heywood Healthcare and Fairport Baptist Homes, served on the Motors Liquidation Co. and Chrysler LLC matters, represented indenture trustees in cross-border note issuances, foreign representatives under Chapter 15, and insurers in the Purdue Pharma, USA Gymnastics, and several religious-organization bankruptcy cases. Before Dentons, she spent five years as in-house counsel at the New York City Energy Efficiency Corporation and practiced at Kramer Levin Naftalis & Frankel LLP and Thacher Proffitt & Wood.

Jasmine earned her JD, cum laude, from the University of Illinois College of Law in 2014 and her BA from the University of Notre Dame in 2011. She is admitted in Illinois, California, Colorado, Missouri, and Wisconsin, and before the US Bankruptcy Courts for the Northern District of Illinois, the District of Colorado, and the Eastern District of Wisconsin, and the US District Courts for the Northern District of Illinois, the Central and Northern Districts of California, the District of Colorado, and the Western District of Wisconsin.

Jasmine was a 2021 National Conference of Bankruptcy Judges Blackshear Presidential Fellow.

Jasmine is a member of the American Bar Association. She co-authored “A Tale of Two Statutes – Limitations Applicable to Wrongful Death Claims Allegedly Caused by a Defective Product” in DRI’s Strictly Speaking product liability newsletter (December 2021) and presented “Precision v. Concision” at the Knowing Your Writes: Next Level Legal Writing Seminar in Madison, Wisconsin (May 2017).

Before joining Dentons in 2025, Jasmine represented a medical provider as debtor in a Chapter 11 bankruptcy filing and built a commercial litigation record that includes second-chairing a two-week trial in California for a major transportation corporation, obtaining a defense verdict in a breach of contract case for a global manufacturer, and winning a motion to dismiss on a novel statute of limitations defense that was a matter of first impression under Colorado law. She has obtained favorable arbitration decisions for oil and gas and global hospitality clients, a favorable summary judgment in a dispute with a large school district, a favorable resolution of a products liability case for a global automotive manufacturer and has deposed or defended more than 90 deponents. She also served as in-house counsel to a major transportation corporation.