Taxation & Estate Planning

Probate and Trust Litigation Committee Meeting in Bonita Springs on May

By Juan C. Antúnez

Click here for a PDF copy of the Agenda and related Reports/White Papers for the Probate and Trust Litigation Committee Meeting in Bonita Springs on May 22, 2008. I found the following legislative items especially interesting:

• Corporate trustees should be happy with the new legislation being proposed in House Bill 435 [Agenda ITEM 2]. This bill would make the following changes to Florida's Trust Code:

1. F.S. 763.0703(7) would be amended to provide for the type of "directed trusts" banks and trust companies have been lobbying for. Click here for the back story on this issue.
2. F.S. 736.0802(10) would be amended to make it much more difficult to cut off a trustee's access to trust funds to pay attorney's fees when being sued for breach of trust. Click here for an example of the type anti-trustee ruling this legislation is attempting to block.
3. F.S. 736.1008 would be amended to set new outside time limits on when a beneficiary could sue a trustee for breach of trust.

• It looks like the proposed new rule giving heirs standing to challenge a deathbed marriage on the grounds of fraud, duress or undue influence I previously wrote about [click here] is coming up for a vote [Agenda ITEM 4]. This is good public policy, I hope it becomes law soon.
  

Questions/comments regarding the meeting and the linked-to materials should be directed to the committee chair: William ("Bill") T. Hennessey.

Full post as published by Florida Probate Litigation Blog on May 19, 2008 (boomark / email).