It is possible that the bonus payments, right before and in knowledge of bankruptcy declaration, should be considered a fraudulent conveyance, and can be clawed back.
Who gets them is another story.
IIRC the normal order of payments priority, short-term creditors get paid first... that is, earned back wages, vendors. Then secured lenders. There won’t be anything left for the stockholders, or at most crumbs.
A severance is not an earned obligation—it’s a kind of employee bonus. It would come at the expense of the other creditors. I don’t think it should happen.
In any event, a few management bonuses spread out over thousands of workers wouldn’t amount to much. It’s the insult that’s got everyone up in arms.
There's a reason why this story is making national news. The company is headquartered in New Jersey, and several members of the state's Congressional delegation are making political hay out of it. The idea that these laid-off workers have anything to complain about is laughable when you have a national unemployment rate below 4% and employers are desperate to find good help. But this is New Jersey we're talking about ... and the state is a fiscal disaster that employers are fleeing in droves.