Blackjewel is in a confirmed liquidation posture: the court confirmed the First Amended Joint Chapter 11 Plan of Liquidation on March 22, 2021, putting the case on a wind-down and claims-resolution path under the confirmation orderDkt. 3147.
The case began with Blackjewel’s July 1, 2019 chapter 11 filing in the Southern District of West Virginia, with schedules and statements still incomplete at filing and the initial plan and disclosure-statement deadlines set for October 29, 2019 in the voluntary petitionDkt. 1. The debtor’s first-day declaration described a coal mining and processing enterprise funded by a layered prepetition capital structure, including a $34.0 million Riverstone term facility, equipment debt owed to Caterpillar and Fifth Third, United Bank revolver and term debt, coal prepayment obligations, and insider or affiliated revolving loans, totaling roughly $88.9 million in identified prepetition funded debt in the Hoops first-day declarationDkt. 14.
Early case pressure also included employee and wage-related litigation, with putative class and adversary complaints filed shortly after the petition date against Blackjewel and related parties, including the Engelbrecht class action complaintDkt. 1 and the Abner adversary complaintDkt. 1. The restructuring path ultimately resolved into liquidation rather than standalone emergence: the debtor filed the solicitation version of the First Amended Joint Chapter 11 Plan of Liquidation on October 21, 2020, followed by a revised plan-supplement exhibit in December, before confirmation in March 2021 through the and .
