(AP) COLUMBIA, S.C. — James Brown’s charitable trust had withered to just $14,000 and his estate was saddled with more than $20 million in debt before a professional money manager was able to turn it around, an attorney told The Associated Press. Under a complex 2009 settlement, the manager took control of Brown’s assets from Keep Reading…
Felix Robert LaSaracina “carefully and methodically defrauded his victims over many years, knowing all the while that what he was doing was wrong,” according to a government sentencing memorandum that paints the former Norwich accountant as a dishonest schemer. Assistant U.S. Attorney Michael McGarry, who signed the 33-page document, rejects the notion that LaSaracina’s “alleged Keep Reading…
WEST PALM BEACH — An eccentric Palm Beach man’s generous bequest to leave the bulk of his multimillion-dollar estate to the poor children of Panama has sparked vicious legal battles both here and in the impoverished Central American nation. The war intensified this week when the 4th District Court of Appeal agreed that a Boca Raton Keep Reading…
Should court-appointed attorneys for society’s most vulnerable enjoy immunity from liability for their actions, and, if so, how much? That was the question facing the Connecticut Supreme Court last week in the aftermath of a lawsuit filed by the estate of Daniel Gross, a New York resident whose visit to Connecticut ended in a 10-month Keep Reading…
Let’s not get too excited yet, but it is noteworthy that a California court actually appears to be putting a family’s rights of inheritance ahead of too frequent business-as-usual legal industry tactics. Orange County Superior Court Approves RICO Complaint against Law Firm Involved in 25 million dollar fraud on the founders and heirs of Alta Keep Reading…
Estate of Denial® provides news, analysis and commentary on abusive practices occurring in probate courts and via probate instruments (wills, trusts, guardianships, powers of attorney). We provide original perspective to educate the public regarding this growing threat to both individual freedoms and property rights.As problems with the Tennessee judiciary are a regular topic here at Estate of Denial®, this post from Memphis’ The Daily News was noted with interest: GOP Proposals Take Aim at Tennessee Courts Republicans in the Tennessee Legislature are taking a close look at the judiciary branch this year, with several proposals expected to be Keep Reading…
Courtroom cronyism is certainly a frequent factor in the abusive probate cases discussed here at Estate of Denial® . EconomicFreedom.org describes cronyism as follows: Cronyism occurs when an individual or organization colludes with government officials to get forced benefits they could not have otherwise obtained voluntarily. Those benefits come at the expense of consumers, taxpayers, Keep Reading…
In September senior assistant Attorney General (AG) C.H. Jones wrote to a Richland County court that the AG’s office was “ready and more than willing” to release a copy of the contract under which Columbia attorney Kenneth Wingate is suing former James Brown trustees, Robert Buchanan of Aiken and Adele Pope of Newberry. It now Keep Reading…
Marion County Prosecutor Terry Curry has filed theft charges in two separate white-collar crime cases, he said today, in which a total of about $800,000 was stolen. In the first case, prosecutors charged Stacy H. Sheedy, an Indianapolis attorney and accountant, with three counts of theft and one count of forgery, according to a release Keep Reading…
Nearly 50 years after country star “Gentleman” Jim Reeves died in a Brentwood plane crash, a Nashville judge will settle once and for all the fate of his still-lucrative musical legacy. On Monday, a trial gets under way in Davidson County Probate Court to decide the proper division of the income from Reeves’ royalties — which Keep Reading…
