Leahy V. Trans Jones Inc‪.‬

ROBERT B. KRUPANSKY, Senior Circuit Judge. Plaintiff-Appellant, John C. Leahy has appealed the district court's grant of summary judgment in favor of defendants-appellees, Trans Jones, Inc. (Trans Jones), Dean Duffey, Thomas Hummer, William Ludwick, Fred Gesell, Bill Malone, Henry Whitaker and William Covert. In this proceeding under the Employee Retirement Income Security Act of 1974 (ERISA), Leahy charged that the defendant company, the members of the Trans Jones Employee Stock Ownership Plan Committee (the Committee) and the Plan Trustees wrongfully denied him a lump sum distribution of his retirement benefits upon early retirement. The district court granted summary judgment to the defendants on May 22, 1992, and Leahy filed a timely notice of appeal. Thereafter, on December 30, 1992, Trans Jones filed a Chapter 11 bankruptcy petition in the United States District Court for the Eastern District of Michigan. Trans Jones then filed a notice of the bankruptcy petition with this court, requesting the statutory stay required by 11 U.S.C. § 362. This court granted the stay and dismissed Trans Jones as a defendant in this appeal, permitting the appeal to proceed only as to the named individual defendants.