Our attorneys effectively leveraged $600,000 of a terminally ill client’s tax exemptions to create a $3 million savings fund for the client’s family tax-free. As a result, the client was able to create a large pool of assets that would cover the education and health care needs for the family for generations.
Through quick action and strategic litigation, our estate planning attorneys assisted an elderly client in a quest to recover over $180,000 that had been usurped by another family member.
When a trustee attempted to skim $100,000 from a widow’s trust, our attorneys quickly intervened to thwart the trustee’s plan. We immediately facilitated cancellation of the trustee’s access to our client’s trust, notified the state agency to conduct an elder abuse investigation, and commenced litigation that recovered all of the stolen funds.
SITUATION: A client who owned a large construction company sought legal counsel to protect the client’s business from interruption or even cessation should a lawsuit arise.
STRATEGY: Our business attorneys set up a separate legal entity, in this case an LLC, to purchase millions of dollars-worth of heavy equipment and vehicles of the client’s operating business. Great care was used to document this strategy to show it was based on substance and not form. We made certain that all bills of sale, leases, contracts and ledgers showing lease payments were prepared, just as in an arm’s length sale and lease back transaction with a third party, and the client even paid income taxes on the transaction.
RESULT: A few years later, the operating business was sued and suffered a financial loss in the hundreds of thousands of dollars. However, the client was elated that all of the equipment and vehicles were protected from the loss. As a result, the client was able to establish a new operating business, lease the equipment and vehicles from the LLC, and continue to support the client’s family and lifestyle.
SITUATION: A group of heirs engaged Lawrence Kamin to represent them in a claim for lost inheritance after another law firm lost their Will contest in Probate Court. Our clients were due to receive an inheritance under their grandfather’s and step-grandmother’s irrevocable joint and mutual Will after both grandparents had died. Following the death of the grandfather, a law firm assisted the step-grandmother and her beneficiaries in creating a second Will that disinherited our clients. Following the death of the step-grandmother, her children probated the invalid second Will and divided the assets without paying out to our clients.
STRATEGY: Our litigation attorneys used public records to establish how the step-grandmother’s children wrongfully looted the estate. Knowing a Will challenge filed by one of our clients had already been dismissed in Probate Court, Lawrence Kamin’s strategy was to file a complaint with the Chancery Court alleging a violation of the joint and mutual Will, which required a 50/50 distribution of assets between both the grandfather’s and step-grandmother’s heirs. Lawrence Kamin built a compelling case against the step-grandmother’s children and the law firm that prepared and probated the invalid second Will, successfully alleging that the defendants knowingly concealed their actions from our clients, which tolled the running of otherwise applicable limitation periods. After defeating the defendants’ motions to dismiss, our attorneys sought a favorable settlement to achieve our clients’ goals.
RESULT: Lawrence Kamin’s skilled attorneys turned what seemed to be a shut-out into a big win for our clients. We secured nearly all of their expected inheritance and saved our clients substantial time and expense associated with protracted litigation.
SITUATION: A high net worth and charitably-inclined client wanted to get their nieces and nephews involved in philanthropy.
STRATEGY: Our estate planning attorneys designed and created a private foundation for the client to support a number of charities that enlisted the children’s input as to which worthy causes the foundation would support.
RESULT: After just a couple of years, the client exuberantly shared that the family’s culture was significantly improved by the existence of the foundation. As a result, the family’s holiday conversations moved away from gifts exchanged to the charities they hoped to benefit and how they planned to invest personal time in charitable endeavors.
SITUATION: The children of a deceased parent came to Lawrence Kamin for urgent legal assistance when the parent’s hired caretaker claimed to assume ownership of all of the parent’s assets, including the home.
STRATEGY: Lawrence Kamin immediately launched a battery of investigative tactics, scouring land ownership records and court records, to gather evidence while simultaneously engaging the police and state agencies to commence an elder abuse investigation. With a few days of the initial client meeting, our attorneys had filed the necessary court petition and documents to initiate civil legal action to recover the decedent’s assets from the caregiver. Our firm’s due diligence also uncovered that the caretaker had coerced the decedent into changing asset ownership and beneficiary designations and into creating a new Will that disinherited the children and left everything to the caretaker.
RESULT: By acting quickly, Lawrence Kamin was able to invalidate the Will and all the asset ownership and beneficiary changes in less than one year, and return the home and other assets to their rightful owners – our clients, the decedent’s children.
SITUATION: An extremely wealthy client engaged Lawrence Kamin to devise a strategy that would allow a substantial portion of their estate to be gifted to their children while allowing the client to maintain control and retain the income from the gifted assets.
STRATEGY: Our seasoned tax planning attorneys structured and implemented a plan. Using special trusts and agreements enabled the client to gift tens of millions of dollars in assets with great appreciation potential to their children without incurring any gift taxes. Our strategy effectively utilized tax laws and allowed the client to manage the gifted assets and to receive the income from the assets for over a decade.
RESULT: Client’s goals were effectively achieved. As a result of Lawrence Kamin’s tax planning strategy, the assets remained under the client’s control, but were effectively removed from his taxable estate, thereby saving his estate millions of dollars.
Results content provided on this page is intended to be representative of the types of client matters Lawrence Kamin attorneys have handled and the legal expertise our professionals possess. Past performance is no guarantee of future results.
