“Bottom line, however, is that I don’t have enough information to opine as to whether anything improper occurred, or not.”
I have experience with a number of retail bankruptcies as a creditor. Based on my experience the attorneys and accountants working for the creditors are extremely good at extracting every penny out of the carcass of the company. If anything improper took place before the bankruptcy was filed, or during the bankruptcy process, they will discover it and provide the information to the bankruptcy judge and the appropriate prosecutor.
The judge overseeing a bankruptcy of this size likely has plenty of experience and is tough as nails. Bankruptcy judges aren’t politicized, they focus on shutting the firm down efficiently and protecting the assets for the creditors as provided for in the law. The politicians making noise know the process will be fair and governed by the laws they wrote. If the politicians don’t like the rules governing payments to workers and executives, they have only themselves to blame.
I didn’t do much retail - mostly real estate developers and ag. So I’ll yield to you on retail. By the time we got down to spending a dollar to collect 3 dollars, we started looking at things pretty closely to maker sure it was worth keeping up the effort.
On the other hand, if someone was willing to fight, there must be something there worth fighting over.
They are full of sh!t because these problems weren't a big secret in business circles -- but none of these dopes said a damn thing about it until after the company shut down.