John Pankauski is a West Palm Beach, FL probate litigator and founder of the Pankauski Law Firm PLLC and author of the upcoming book Pankauski’s Trustee Book, An Individual’s Guide to Money, Misfits, Marriages and Mismanagement.  He practices estate & trust law on the intracoastal in downtown West Palm Beach, Florida.

The Pankauski Law Firm PLLC, a Palm Beach estate & trust litigation boutique in West Palm Beach, Florida successfully represented the owner of a high six figure investment joint account in Palm Beach probate court and at mediation.

The Pankauski Law Firm PLLC, a West Palm Beach estate litigation firm, successfully resolved an inheritance lawsuit set for trial in June in the downtown West Palm Beach courthouse.  This Palm Beach estate lawsuit included a St. Lucie County probate, a private Florida business, a corporate buy-sell agreement, Florida stock certificates and a Boca Raton personal representative.

Palm Beach estate litigation firms are used to “chasing the money” for their estate clients after winning damages at a Palm Beach probate trial. Once the winning side gets a judgment against a beneficiary or executor, you need begin to satisfy that judgment:  getting your Florida probate clients paid.  What if the defendant or “bad guy” transferred assets before or during the Palm Beach estate lawsuit in an attempt to hide assets?  That’s fraud in Florida and fraud in Massachusetts.  Can you sue the family members who the bad guy transferred the assets to? You betcha!

Does a Palm Beach lawfirm need to turn over its records regarding a medical expert or doctor which the Palm Beach law firm has hired ?  If the doctor can’t testify well about his relationship with the Palm Beach lawfirm that hired her or him, then yes.  So said a Palm Beach appeals court on March 5th, 2014.  Palm Beach probate litigators hire doctors to advise on and testify to opinions about UNDUE INFLUENCE &  lack of mental capacity to write a will in Palm Beach will contests. You may want to read this 4th District Court of Appeal legal opinion where a Palm Beach estate, and the Palm Beach personal representative were a party.

Are you involved in a Palm Beach lawsuit where you are chasing money?  Perhaps you won a judgment after a Palm Beach trial and the Palm Beach lawsuit gave you damages—now you have to get paid, right?  So, you conduct Florida proceedings supplementary to try to satisfy your final judgment.  You want to discover where the money is so you can be paid, right?  If you are a creditor or one who is involved in a lawsuit where you expect to get damages from the Palm Beach trial, you may want to read this March 5, 2014 opinion of the Palm Beach appeals court.  Can someone keep money offshore and keep it from creditors ?

How does inherited wealth affect your heirs?  Does leaving an inheritance to adult children help them in life or does it remove incentive and a desire to be productive?  Anderson Cooper, the CNN newsman, and host of the news show AC360, http://ac360.blogs.cnn.com/, was in the news himself lately.  Yahoo reported that Cooper, son of Gloria Vanderbilt, told Howard Stern, http://www.howardstern.com/, that he would not be inheriting from his mom’s wealth. 

Trust Beneficiary Loses Trustee Removal Action & Appeal Anyone involved in the administration of a Palm Beach trust knows that a Florida trust beneficiary cannot remove a trustee just because the beneficiary doesn’t like the trustee. Or, put a better way perhaps: a Palm Beach probate court will not remove a Florida trustee just because the beneficiary and trustee don’t get along. More is needed to remove a trustee under the Florida Trust Code. Under Florida law, for a trust beneficiary to successfully remove a Palm Beach trustee from continuing to serve as trustee, you need to PROVE that the trustee is unfit, engaged in a breach of fiduciary duty, caused damage to the trust or otherwise is interfering with the efficient administration of the Florida trust. Here’s a Hawaii trust case from 6 days ago where a trust beneficiary was representing himself, and lost his trust lawsuit and his appeal.

In Palm Beach trust lawsuits, you generally “get” attorneys fees paid for from the Florida trust if you have rendered a benefit to the Florida trust.  Palm Beach probate courts evaluate whether a “benefit” was conveyed very carefully.  Just because you spend money doesn’t mean that you are going to get reimbursed for your Palm Beach trust litigator fees.  Here’s a California trust & guardianship case decided a few days ago where a lawyer wanted fees 7 years after providing services in a trust and guardianship matter.  This case may cause a Palm Beach trust beneficiary, or someone involved in a Palm Beach guardianship case, wonder whether you will get your probate legal fees reimbursed….or whether you pay your guardianship lawyer yourself.

This is a March 27, 2014 guardianship case from the Supreme Court of Mississippi which dealt with prudent investing and transfering a guardianship to another state.  The minor’s guardian petitioned for transfer of the guardianship to Louisiana, where the ward and guardian had moved.  It involves a minor’s $$$, lots of money:  from the loss of the minor’s father at the Deepwater Horizon oil rig explosion on April 20, 2010.