Making pen or pencil changes to a will is not a good way to avoid paying your lawyer to redo the instrument by doing it yourself. Every now and then, a thrifty testator decides that he or she will perform the alterations independent of counsel. Bad Idea!
Continue Reading Puleeze Don’t Mark Up Your Will !

Choosing a testamentary trustee can be a difficult task. Your trustee has the job of administering the assets of your trust for the benefit of loved ones long after you are gone. In effect, the trustee is the hand that reaches beyond the grave on your behalf. Your choice of trustee should merit your most serious consideration.Continue Reading Choosing A Testamentary Trustee

Fellow lawblogger Joel A. Schoenmeyer ‘s “Death and Taxesblog.com” has discovered -and published�a copy of the will of the late Richard Nixon. Not only does the document have some significance for those of us with historical bent (before your lawblogger went to law school, I managed to earn a Master’s Degree in American History)…

A Suffolk County, New York State Supreme Court Justice has denied the petition of a widow to have her late husband’s body exhumed so that it might be cremated in accordance with what she claimed to have been his last wishes.
Continue Reading Exhumation? Not in Suffolk County !

It is possible to admit a lost will to probate if certain important conditions are met. Section 1407 of New York’s Surrogate’s Court Procedure Act provides that a lost or destroyed will is admissible if (1) it is established the will has not been revoked, (2) The will has been executed in the procedure provided for by law and (3) All of the provisions of the will are clearly and distinctly proved by each of at least two credible witnesses or by a copy or draft of a will proved to be true and complete.
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Leanna Hamill’s Massachusetts Estate Planning and Elder Law blog contains a useful set of instructions as to how and why you should take special pains to store your will and other important legal documents. She goes beyond the “put em where they won’t burn” basics. Her excellent article merits your consideration.

For some time, I have enjoyed reading Death and Taxes -The Blog which is published by Chicago area attorney Joel A. Schoenmeyer. While the blog’s focus is understandably on Illinois law (just as my blog tries to focus upon New York law), a variety of topics are well-presented which are of common interest to all of us interested in the field of probate and estate law and litigation.
Continue Reading Death and Taxes Law Blogger Reviews Dickens’ Bleak House

In terrorem (“no contest”) clauses are frequently used by testators and attorney draftspersons to dissuade legatees from contesting wills by providing that a legatee who contests the will forfeits his or her bequest. Section 3-3.5 of the Estates Powers and Trusts Law permits in terrorem clauses but with certain specific limitations
Continue Reading In Terrorem Clauses