Trusts & Estates

Okla. Law Determines Who Controls Social Media Accounts After Death

Estate executors in Oklahoma have been granted control over a dead person’s social media accounts according to a new law that went into effect Nov. 1. Although the legislation conflicts with most social media users agreements by assuming the accounts to be the property of the creator, rather than belonging…

Nov 30, 2010 11:07 PM CST

Multimillionaire Spent Minimally as His Guardians, Trustees, Lawyers & Others Got $50M

Ugo di Portanova is still worth about $65 million. But the partially incapacitated Texas man has lost about $50 million, since he was first stripped of control of his money in 1967, in the form of fees and other distributions paid out to dozens of Harris County Probate Court-appointed guardians,…

Nov 29, 2010 5:57 PM CST

Courts to Determine Ownership of 14-Pound Pearl, 840-Pound Emerald

Large gemstones are at the center of two separate court fights over ownership rights. California emerald collector Anthony Thomas maintains he paid Brazilian miners $60,000 for the huge emerald in 2001, but instead of shipping it to him they resold it for more money, the Associated Press reports. As proof,…

Nov 10, 2010 3:33 PM CST

Israeli Attorney Is 1st Foreign Law School Grad to Become Wis. Lawyer, Under New Rule

An Israeli attorney who earned her law degree from Bar Ilan University Law School in her home country is the first graduate of a foreign law school to win admission to the Wisconsin bar under a new rule that no longer requires graduation from an American Bar Association-accredited institution. Deborah…

Oct 6, 2010 12:00 AM CDT

Newspaper: ‘Weak-Kneed’ Discipline Council Stumbled in Probate Judge Matter

In a 2004 will, Josephine Smoron left almost all her considerable assets, which included a dairy farm, to her longtime caretaker. A subsequent estate document in 2006 explained that she had expressly disinherited several churches. But as she lay dying in 2009 her court-appointed conservator transferred her assets to two…

Oct 4, 2010 6:58 PM CDT

Supreme Court to Hear Anna Nicole Smith Estate Claim to Late Husband’s Fortune

The U.S. Supreme Court has agreed to hear an appeal by the heirs of Anna Nicole Smith in a battle over her late husband’s fortune. The Supreme Court granted cert today, the Associated Press reports. The San Francisco-based 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals ruled in March that Smith’s heirs…

Sep 28, 2010 2:30 PM CDT

Using Fake Bar Number, ‘Lawyer’ Handled 20 Civil Matters, Newspaper Reports

When Kelly Fulmer resigned from the Walton-Verona school board this week, after more than a decade of service, he didn’t give a reason. But he told fellow board members in the Kentucky school district they would be reading about him in the newspaper, reports the Cincinnati Enquirer. And they did:…

Sep 23, 2010 5:33 PM CDT

Lawyer Pleads Guilty in $2.5M Theft Case; Failure to File Tax Returns Alerted Authorities

Alerted by a state office that a New York lawyer had failed to file tax returns, authorities in Erie County initiated an investigation that eventually led to a guilty plea today by now-suspended attorney Kenneth Bernas in a $2.5 million-plus case. He pleaded guilty in state court in Buffalo to…

Sep 21, 2010 8:13 PM CDT

Lawyer’s Legal Fight with School Is ‘Cautionary Tale of the Internet Age’

An estate planning lawyer in New York has rewritten his will and sued his son’s school over the suspension of the teen due to topless photos found on the youth’s laptop. Lawyer Herbert Nass claims it was unfair for the Horace Mann School, his own alma mater, to punish his…

Sep 1, 2010 3:21 PM CDT

Judge Orders Paul Weiss, Lowenstein to Pay $1.96M in Fees for Frivolous Suit

A New Jersey judge who found that two BigLaw law firms filed a frivolous suit has ordered them to pay $1.96 million for their opponents’ legal fees. The firms, Paul Weiss Rifkind Wharton & Garrison and Lowenstein Sandler, had filed the suit on behalf of billionaire Ronald Perelman, the American…

Aug 26, 2010 11:54 AM CDT

DNA Test Said to Knock Girl, 9, Out of Battle for Intestate Chess Champ’s $2M Estate

A DNA test has proven that a famous chess champion was not the father of a 9-year-old girl whose mother has been battling for a share of his estimated $2 million estate. But that still leaves a Japanese woman who says she was Bobby Fischer’s wife battling with two of…

Aug 17, 2010 9:04 PM CDT

Vet Lost Home After Lawyer Drafted Trust Rather Than Will, Ethics Complaint Says

A lawyer in suburban Chicago has been accused in an ethics complaint of helping a couple swindle an elderly veteran out of his home. Lawyer Gary R. Williams is accused of creating a living trust that gave control of the assets belonging to Angelo Biondo to the World War II…

Aug 3, 2010 4:08 PM CDT

Procrastinating Lawyer’s Lies About Estate Work Require Disbarment, Says Top NH Court

For nearly five years after Bertha McInnes died on Sept. 12, 1998, attorney Lynn Morse worked on her $461,500 estate, filing an appearance in Rockingham County Probate Court within 10 days of her death. Again and again, Morse sought delays and promised to meet deadlines but didn’t. When the executrix,…

Jul 22, 2010 7:15 PM CDT

States’ Repeal of Rule Against Perpetuities Creates US Aristocracy, Law Prof Says

The rule against perpetuities that vexed so many law students has been eliminated in many states, and it’s having an impact outside the halls of academia. The rule had effectively limited the terms of family trusts to about 90 years, Boston College law professor Ray Madoff writes in an op-ed…

Jul 12, 2010 3:30 PM CDT

Woman, 91, Can Keep Exhumed Bodies at Home If She Builds a Crypt, DA Says

Faced with an unusual situation, a Pennsylvania prosecutor is offering an unusual solution. Jean Stevens, 91, who apparently persuaded an unidentified individual to exhume the bodies of two close relatives so she could talk with them as they lay on sofas at her home in rural Wyalusing Township, can get…

Jul 6, 2010 10:52 PM CDT