Irrevocable Life Insurance Trusts: Perhaps the Best Kept Secret in Tax Savings
By A. Jude Avelino
An Irrevocable Life Insurance Trust (ILIT) is a trust specifically set up to be the owner and beneficiary of the grantor’s life insurance policy. The grantor sets up the trust and has to make some choices—that cannot be changed, hence the term irrevocable—who will be the trustee and beneficiaries. Typically, a beneficiary cannot be the trustee of his or her own share of the trust.

The Gift of GRAT: Benefit From an Underperforming Market with an Estate Freezing Strategy
By A. Jude Avelino
There is little to be excited about in our current economic situation.  The simultaneous struggles of housing market, credit and liquidity markets, and the performance of the stock market has lead to a stagnant U.S. economy.  However, interest rates have remained low.  This combination of slumping markets and low interest rates creates a good opportunity to utilize an estate freezing strategy called a Grantor Retained Annuity Trust or GRAT.

Are Undocumented Aliens Barred from Collecting Lost Wages in Personal Injury Suits?
By Andrew P. Nitkewicz
The answer to this question may not be so clear anymore.  I currently represent the estate of an undocumented alien who died as a result of an automobile accident.  During a mediation conference my adversary presented the mediator with a recent trial court decision that appeared to reverse decades of case law and New York State public policy permitting undocumented aliens to collect future lost wages in personal injury actions.  That case was and is Majlinger v. Cassino Construction Corp., 766 N.Y.S.2d 332 (Sup. Ct. Richmond County 2003).

The Scope of Expert Disclosure in Medical Malpractice Actions: The Impact of electronic Search Programs and the Internet
By Andrew P. Nitkewicz
The scope of expert disclosure in Medical Malpractice actions continues to be an unsettled and controversial area of New York Law.  The Courts have always been faced with the dilemma of balancing the need for pre-trial disclosure of expert witness information with the necessity of shielding the identity until the time of trial.  The massive influx of computer technology over the past decade has only served to further complicate this bewildering dilemma for the New York Courts.