Andre D. Bouffard

University of Maine School of Law, J.D., cum laude; Executive Editor, Maine Law Review

St. Lawrence University, B.A., cum laude, Phi Beta Kappa

• Andre represented a business owner in an appeal to the Vermont Supreme Court from a judgment compelling the client to sell his half interest in the business to his partner. Andre succeeded in getting the judgment reversed and the case dismissed, setting an important contract law precedent.
• Andre represented a mortgage lender in an appeal to the Vermont Supreme Court after the client had suffered an adverse judgment after trial for compensatory and punitive damages and legal fees, arising from the lender’s response to serious flood damage to a borrower’s home, which was uninsured due to the lender’s failure to pay insurance premiums from the borrowers’ escrow funds. Andre succeeded in getting the punitive damages award reversed on appeal, and also obtained reversal of the legal fees award, enabling the client to resolve the matter on favorable terms.
• Andre represented a Canadian bank in a U.S. Bankruptcy case of a borrower that had fraudulently reported its financial condition to the bank, fraudulently transferred assets to associates in Canada and Mexico, and continued its fraudulent activity during the bankruptcy case. The borrower’s assets were eventually liquidated for the benefit of the bank, the client recovered fraudulently transferred assets from Canada and Mexico, and the principals of the borrower were prosecuted criminally.
• Andre represented a regional healthcare company in the acquisition through bankruptcy auction of the former campus of a defunct college in southern Vermont.
• Andre represented a client in an appeal to the Vermont Supreme Court of an adverse verdict for breach of fiduciary duty to the estate of an uncle who had sold property to the client on terms claimed by the executor (a sibling) to be unfair. The judgment was reversed and the case was dismissed.
• Represented the executor of the estate of one of the largest real estate investors in Chittenden County, Vermont, where the probate proceedings involved complex inter-family disputes, the division of extensive interrelated real estate assets and liabilities, and complex fiduciary and estate tax issues. The estate was administered successfully and the executor discharged without any tax disputes.
• Represented a mortgage lender in an appeal to the Vermont Supreme Court after the lender’s foreclosure action had been dismissed for lack of standing in a manner that could have forfeited the mortgage. Andre obtained a decision on appeal that protected the client’s mortgage rights, resulting in a later full recovery of the loan collateral.
• Andre represented a bank that had invested large sums in commercial paper sold by a company that was actually operating a Ponzi scheme. The scheme involved the repeated sale of the same paper and the sale of fictitious paper not backed by a real debt. In the debtor’s bankruptcy proceedings, Andre successfully defended the bank’s rights to credit insurance recoveries from competing claims by a bankruptcy trustee, substantially reducing the bank’s losses on the investment.

Vermont, 1986

U.S. District Court, District of Vermont, 1988

U.S. Court of Appeals, Second Circuit, 2002

U.S. Supreme Court, 2013

American Bar Association, 1992

Vermont Bar Association, Bankruptcy Section

American College of Mortgage Attorneys, Fellow, 2015

Listed in Best Lawyers®, Bankruptcy and Creditor Debtor Rights / Insolvency and Reorganization Law, Commercial Litigation, Litigation – Bankruptcy, 2011-2024

Chambers USA Guide: Financial Services Litigation, 2013

New England Superlawyers: Bankruptcy & Creditor/Debtor Rights; Business Litigation; Estate & Trust Litigation, 2010-2021

Senior Fellow, Litigation Counsel of America, 2014

Served on Board of Directors for Mobius the Mentoring Movement and Vermont Mozart Festival

Oeschger v. GeneThera, Inc., 395 F. Supp. 345 (D. Vt. 2019)(arbitration, jurisdiction)
In re Hermitage Inn Real Estate Holding Company, LLC, 2019 WL 2536075 (Bankr. D. Vt. 2019)(bankruptcy venue)
Estate of Kuhling v. Glaze, 196 A.3d 1125 (Vt. 2018)(fiduciary duty)
Miller v. Flegenheimer, 161 A.3d 524 (Vt. 2016)(contract)
In re Ladieu, 548 B.R. 49 (Bankr. D. Vt. 2016)(chapter 13 bankruptcy)
Vereline v. Woodsville Guaranty Sav. Bank, 2015 WL 9216684 (D. Vt. 2015)(lender liability)
In re Ambassador Ins. Co., Inc., 114 A.3d 492 (Vt. 2015)(insurer insolvency)
In re R. Brown and Sons, Inc., 498 B.R. 425 (Bankr. D. Vt. 2013)(chapter 11 bankruptcy)
Dernier v. Mortgage Network, Inc., 87 A.3d 465 (Vt. 2013)(mortgage foreclosure)
Dan’s City Used Cars, Inc. v. Pelkey, 133 S.Ct. 1769 (U.S. 2013)(federal preemption)
RBS Citizens, N.A. v. Ouhrabka, 30 A.3d 1266 (Vt. 2011)(attachment)
U.S. Bank Nat’l Ass’n v. Kimball, 27 A.3d 1087 (Vt. 2011)(mortgage foreclosure)
In re Liquidation of Home Ins. Co., 913 A.2d 712 (N.H. 2006)(insurer insolvency)
Monahan v. GMAC Mortgage Corp., 893 A.2d 298 (Vt. 2005)(lender liability)
In re Housecraft Industries USA, Inc., 310 F.3d 64 (2d Cir. 2002)(fraudulent transfer)