Trusts. Lots of varieties, and lots of mystery. Here’s some basic information.

Trusts exist for many reasons, most of them bound up in estate planning. Trusts vary in terms of their purposes and terms, but they all have about them a core concept:  they are tri-party agreements that involve fiduciary duties.

A tri-party agreement involves three parties. A trust always has at least one settler/trust, at least one trustee, and at least one beneficiary. The settlor—trustor is a synonymous term here—creates a trust by depositing now, or promising to deposit sometime in the future, often at death—money or other assets. The settlor is also almost always the person who has the trust agreement drafted.

Every trust has at least

The Fifth Amendment to the U.S. Constitution states:  “No person … shall be compelled in any criminal case to be a witness against himself.” In New Jersey, a battle has developed over a legislative committee’s demand for emails from Governor Chris Christie’s people in connection with the Bridgegate investigation. (Alas, 40+ years after Watergate, we finally have another water-related “gate.”)

Absent a grant of immunity, no one can be forced to testify about matters if the testimony may be self-incriminating. But what about emails and other records, created long before the investigation?

I have had one case in my 32+ year career that involved Fifth Amendment claims, and it revolved around a waiver of those claims. So, I’m no

Here’s NPR’s March 10, 2014 report on Marvin M. Brandt Revocable Trust v. U.S., titled Family Trust Wins Supreme Court Fight against Bike Trail. The case is all about railroads and easements, but it’s also about consistency.

Chief Justice John Roberts wrote for an eight Justice majority, with no concurring opinions. He describes the effort to build a transcontinental railroad, the giveaways from the federal government to the railroads, to allow the railroads to fund the construction of the rail beds and tracks (and make very wealthy the likes of Crocker, Gould, Harriman, Stanford, etc.)

The case focuses on an 1875 law that limited the railroad giveaways, due to public unhappiness with the robber baron wealth. Basically, the

Personal Representative is the gender neutral substitute for executor and executrix. The terms identify the individual or entity with responsibility for managing and distributing a decedent’s estate. The only proper term to be used in Arizona is Personal Representative, as Arizona adopted the Uniform Probate Code in 1972, and it uses the gender neutral term. If you have a will that refers to an executor or executrix, the terminology will not affect the process, but if your will uses one of the old terms, it may be time to give the will a look-see, and make sure it’s up-to-date.

So what does a PR do? First, if the decedent dies with a will, the PR will likely be the