Law Office of Todd A. Morth

Focus and practice areas

Bankruptcy is the entire focus of this Buffalo, New York firm. It represents individuals under the two chapters of personal bankruptcy, Chapter 7 and Chapter 13. That single focus tells you who the firm expects to meet, a person carrying consumer debt who wants a legal way through it. Its clients are people, not companies.

The day-to-day work maps to familiar debt problems. The firm helps clients stop collection calls, end wage and bank account garnishment, protect a home from foreclosure, and keep a vehicle from repossession. It also files to wipe out many kinds of debt. These are the pressures that push people toward bankruptcy in the first place, and the firm takes them on directly for the people it represents.

Each of those actions has a legal mechanism behind it. Filing can trigger an automatic stay that pauses collection efforts and halts a garnishment, and it can give a homeowner room to deal with a mortgage default. The firm frames this relief in plain terms, around the outcome a client cares about, like keeping a home or stopping a garnishment.

Chapter 7 and Chapter 13

The two chapters fit different situations, and the firm files under both. Chapter 7 clears qualifying debts and tends to move quickly. Chapter 13 sets up a court-approved repayment plan that runs over a set period, which can help someone hold onto a house or a car while catching up. In my opinion, a lawyer who handles both keeps more options open for the person walking in the door, since the right chapter depends on income, assets, and what someone most wants to protect.

Because the firm works only with individuals, the questions it deals with are personal ones, like a paycheck being garnished or a lender moving against a home. Matching those facts to the correct chapter is the core of the job, and the firm does that for filers across the region.

The attorney's background

Todd A. Morth has practiced bankruptcy law since he finished law school in 1998. That gives the firm more than 20 years of filing cases in Western New York, all of it concentrated in one area of law. A record that long in a single field is worth noting for a client who wants a lawyer doing this work day in and day out.

His path into bankruptcy started early. He took on his first cases as an intern at the Niagara County Legal Aid Society. He then joined a large bankruptcy firm in upstate New York, with work in Buffalo and Rochester, before he left to open his own office. The experience covers both a big-firm caseload and the closer contact of a one-attorney office.

Education and admissions

Morth earned his Juris Doctor cum laude from Case Western Reserve University in 1998. He completed a Bachelor of Science at Cornell University in 1995. He is admitted to practice in the State of New York, and before the United States District Court and the United States Bankruptcy Court for the Western District of New York.

Those admissions carry weight for the kind of work he does. Bankruptcy cases are heard in federal court, and his admission before the Western District of New York bankruptcy court is what lets him file and appear there. For a client, the lawyer taking the case already works inside the court where it will be decided.

Who the firm serves and where

The clients are individuals, and the firm's reach covers Western New York. That includes the Buffalo and Rochester areas, the same two cities where Morth practiced earlier in his career. The geography is consistent for a lawyer who has spent his whole career in the region.

Consumer bankruptcy tends to be local work, tied to a specific court and the rules that govern it. A firm rooted in Western New York, run by someone who has filed there for two decades, brings a practical familiarity with how those cases move through the system. As a reviewer, I read the overlap between where Morth trained and practiced and where he now files as a sign of a settled local firm.

How clients start

The firm offers a free initial consultation, so a prospective client can lay out the full situation before committing to anything. It also uses flat-fee payment plans, so the billing arrangement is settled at the start. For people already under financial strain, a clear and predictable first step counts for something.

Taking only individual bankruptcy also shapes how the firm meets people. The attorney handling the first meeting is the same one who has filed these cases for years, so a client deals with an experienced bankruptcy lawyer from the opening conversation onward.

The firm keeps its scope tight: the two chapters it files and the debt problems it takes on, handled by one attorney. It represents individual filers across Western New York, and each case runs through the United States Bankruptcy Court for the Western District of New York.