BANKRUPTCY? IT DOESN’T CRAMP MY STYLE! While Independent Bank Unsuccessfully Digs For His Full Spectrum Financials, Traverse City Optometrist Mark Noss May Have Already Fraudulently Transferred Property Away From His Creditors…Right Under The Bank’s Nose!
BREAKING: A formerly-secret property transfer and mortgage debt assumption appears to show a fraudulent transfer of a major asset previously held by Traverse City, Michigan optometrist Mark Noss — a potential bankruptcy fraud violation.
Noss filed Chapter 7 bankruptcy in February 2019, and is currently fighting to keep his financials out of federal bankruptcy court as he fights an Adversary Complaint filed in April 2020.
Turns out, there was a formal, written agreement dictating the financial terms between Steven Ingersoll’s Smart Schools, Inc. and Full Spectrum Management, LLC, the entity formed by Mark Noss on March 19, 2014 to assume management of the cash cow known as the Grand Traverse Academy.
A “Technical Information License Agreement”, inked by Noss the same day he formed Full Spectrum, was among a trove of documents released April 30, 2020 along with the adversary complaint filed in federal bankruptcy court by Kelly M. Hagan, the Chapter 7 Bankruptcy Trustee for the estate of Full Spectrum Management, LLC.
Hagan is seeking judgments against Noss and Ingersoll that collectively exceed seven-figures, and to disallow claims against the bankruptcy estate asserted by Noss.
Named defendants include Mark Noss, and several LLC’s controlled by Noss; Steven Ingersoll and three of his many business entities, including Smart Schools Management, Inc., Smart Schools Inc., and Smart Schools Management of Bay City LLC.
The BACKSTORY
Former Grand Traverse Academy management honcho Steven Ingersoll, recently released from federal stir, masterminded the off-loading of an obligation to repay Traverse City State Bank (now Independent Bank) nearly $925,000 in early March 2014 from Smart Schools Management, Inc. to Mark Noss, then president of the Grand Traverse Academy’s board of directors.
In a contemporaneous string of emails from early March 2014 among Steven Ingersoll, Mark Noss and TCSB’s Dan Stahl, a formal deal was struck on March 16, 2014 for Noss to assume the obligation to repay Ingersoll’s outstanding debt, days before the Academy board voted to sever ties with Ingersoll.
Noss didn’t formally sign a management contract for the now-tottering Traverse City charter school until March 19, 2014.
Noss then signed a promissory note on March 20, 2014 as the Managing Member of Full Spectrum Management, LLC, assuming the legal obligation to repay $925,000 left outstanding by Steven Ingersoll’s Smart Schools Management, Inc.
Noss and the Grand Traverse Academy parted ways on June 23, 2017.
Noss filed a Chapter 7 bankruptcy petition February 19, 2019 on behalf of Full Spectrum Management.
Full Spectrum’s “Summary of Liabilities” exceeded $1.0 million, with the lion’s share ($766,925) owed to Independent Bank.
On May 7, 2019, Noss was subpoenaed, and ordered to provide Independent Bank with a dirty laundry list of documents related to his 2014 assumption of nearly $1.0 million owed by convicted felon Steven Ingersoll to Traverse City State Bank. (Independent Bank inherited the mess when in it assumed control of TCSB in 2018.)
A Chapter 7 bankruptcy case does not involve the filing of a plan of repayment as in Chapter 13.
Instead, the bankruptcy trustee gathers and sells the debtor’s nonexempt assets and uses the proceeds of such assets to pay holders of claims (creditors) in accordance with the provisions of the Bankruptcy Code.
Independent Bank was the biggest loser in the Full Spectrum bankruptcy filing: facing the discharge of $766,925 owed by Noss/Full Spectrum.
A hangover of the Grand Traverse Academy’s Steven Ingersoll regime, the massive debt reflected the deal Noss made in 2014, engineered by Ingersoll (and Traverse City State Bank’s Dan Stahl) to personally assume repayment of Ingersoll’s delinquent $989,825 line of credit debt.
Independent Bank filed a civil suit on September 13, 2018 against Full Spectrum in Grand Traverse County’s 13th Circuit Court, seeking repayment of the outstanding debt. The Grand Traverse Academy was named a third-party defendant by Noss/Full Spectrum, asserting that the Traverse City charter school is responsible for causing his liability.
Although court records show a non-jury trial was scheduled to begin June 11, 2019, the Full Spectrum Management Chapter 7 bankruptcy filing on February 19, 2019 triggered an automatic stay.
WAS THIS A FRAUDULENT TRANSFER?
On May 4, 2021, a “Quit Claim Deed” executed on March 19, 2021 popped up in Grand Traverse County’s Register of Deeds database.
The deed, shown above, reveals a Traverse City commercial property, located at 328 Munson Avenue, formerly owned by Mark and Tricia Noss, was transferred to “Nolyn Properties” — a Michigan business entity formed by their daughter Rebekah Noss Lynch on April 6, 2020 — for the sum of $10.00.
On February 25, 2021, Mark and Tricia Noss successfully unloaded the $211,458.50 balance of their $376,000 Small Business Association Promissory Note to “buyer” Nolyn Properties, LLC. Nolyn assumed the obligation to pay all outstanding obligations related to the original 2010 Note.
In addition, on March 19, 2021, Nolyn assumed the obligation to repay the outstanding $355,191 from a $483,000 Business Loan August 21, 2009 issued to business entity Mark D. Noss, O.D., LLC and Mark and Tricia Noss personally by Citizens Bank (now Huntington National Bank).
A formal Warranty Deed (shown below) was subsequently recorded in Grand Traverse County on May 4, 2021, confirming Nolyn’s assumption of a $337,500 mortgage.
But here’s the rub: although the “Nolyn Properties, LLC” was formed in April 2020 by Rebekah Noss Lynch, her father, Mark, is a member (along with Tricia Noss and Rebekah’s husband, Brian Lynch).
Mark Noss signed the mortgage assumption agreement on both sides of the deal: as the “seller” (Mark D. Noss, O. D., LLC) and “buyer” of the transaction.
So if I’m looking at this clearly, it appears that Mark Noss may have “fraudulently” transferred his Munson Avenue property (a Grand Traverse County property — Parcel Number: 51–582–124–01 — valued at roughly $800,000) to Nolyn Properties, LLC for $10.00 and the assumption of roughly $600,000 of debt.
In effect, Mark Noss may have transferred nearly $250,000 in equity from his personal holdings — to an entity he secretly controls.
And out of the grip of his creditors.
Wow, this beats Ann Cardon any day of the week.
