AttorneysEd Center

In June the Supreme Court will rule on the constitutionality of the Federal Defense of Marriage Act ("DOMA") and California Proposition 8. The Court's rulings will have dramatic implications for employee benefit plans covering domestic partners and the taxation of domestic partner benefits. Join Todd Solomon, a partner at McDermott Will & Emery LLP, and a frequent speaker and writer on employee benefits issues resulting from domestic partnerships and same-sex marriages, as he discusses the Court's rulings, the future of DOMA and Proposition 8, and the implications for benefit plan sponsors. Topics include: • The taxation of domestic partner benefits (Federal and state) after the Court's rulings. • The status of same-sex marriages, civil unions, and domestic partnerships. • Can same-sex couples marry in California? • What policies and procedures should employers and their counsel be updating in light of the Court's rulings?

Jean Pawlow and Kevin Spencer, McDermott Will & Emery LLP, discuss the ethical pitfalls that can confront tax practitioners, and how such pitfalls can be avoided. Topics covered: • Errors on tax returns (including amended returns) • Errors made during IRS examination and appeals • Disclosing information to the IRS • Disclosure of privileged information and waiver • Paying fact witnesses during litigation • Spoliation and duty to preserve evidence • Candor before a tribunal and the IRS • Backdating of documents • Levels of tax opinions Specific Ethics Rules and other authorities discussed are ABA Model Rules and Opinions, Circular 230, AICPA Rules, Internal Revenue Code and Treasury Regulations, and case law, including U.S. Supreme Court decisions.

Estate planning dramatically changed as a result of the enactment of the American Taxpayer Relief Act of 2012 (“ATRA”). Join Ed Brown and John Garland as they discuss why the focus of planning must now shift to take into account the ancillary, sometimes not-readily-apparent consequences of ATRA. Topics covered include: • estate plans that place greater emphasis on income tax issues, gaining a step-up in basis, taking care of one’s family as opposed to having estate taxes drive the planning strategies, and exploring greater opportunities for more effective asset protection; • the increased significance of state estate and inheritance taxes, changes to marital deduction formulas, gifting strategies, the use of disclaimers, and whether to rely on portability; and • the effects of ATRA on traditional estate planning vehicles such as irrevocable life insurance trusts, intentionally defective irrevocable trusts, and family limited partnerships.

Barry Engel covers important developments in asset protection and estate planning during the period July 2012-November 2013. Topics include an update on relevant federal gift and estate tax developments, domestic and foreign statutory and case law issues specific to self-settled spendthrift trusts and to legal entities used in asset protection, and applicable developments involving the Foreign Account Tax Compliance Act (FATCA) under the HIRE Act.

Because of the importance to the client of his or her estate, regardless of size, estate planning attorneys should consider some degree of asset protection as part of the client’s overall estate planning. Join Barry Engel and Ed Brown as they provide appropriate asset protection planning strategies tailored to those individuals with small to medium-sized estates. Topics include: 1) the use of exemptions, which are valuable in that they provide categories of assets that are free from legal process as a judgment creditor attempts to collect a judgment; 2) joint ownership of property, which, based upon the state in which the individual lives, may render property either unavailable to a judgment creditor, more difficult to levy against, or less attractive to a creditor as an asset to pursue; 3) spousal gifting; 4) insurance; 5) annuities; 6) the use of family limited partnerships and family limited liability companies, due to the protection provided by charging order

As in other areas of the law, asset protection attorneys can learn important lessons and sharpen their planning skills by knowing and understanding the results of prior cases. Join Barry Engel as he provides an in-depth review and discussion of: the more important reported cases involving litigation challenges to asset protection trusts (as well as some unreported cases and settled cases); and the process of “protective measures” or “emergency measures” available to trustees of asset protection trusts when trust assets are faced with a threat.

Too often the asset protection planning process stops at protecting individually held assets; the assets of the client’s operating business, professional practice and/or real estate holdings are left unattended. Join Barry Engel as he discusses various principles, concepts and strategies designed to address these areas of need, including: 1) a business or professional practice settling a trust; 2) a business or professional practice undergoing a divisive reorganization to accomplish asset protection goals; 3) a business or professional practice forming and funding one or more related entities to which assets are contributed; 4) a business or professional practice selling its assets to a separately owned company and then leasing the assets back from the purchasing company; 5) “liquefying” the equity of a business or professional practice and contributing the proceeds to an integrated estate planning trust; and 6) asset protection planning structures owning real estate and the special considerations required by this immovable asset class.

Todd Solomon, a partner at McDermott Will & Emery LLP, and a frequent speaker and writer on employee benefits issues resulting from domestic partnerships and same-sex marriages, discusses the impact of the New York same-sex marriage law on employee benefit plans. Topics include: • which plans are required to offer coverage to same-sex spouses, • the federal and state tax implications of providing such coverage, and • best practices for administering a program that covers same-sex spouses.

Join Barry Engel as he covers the latest developments in asset protection and integrated estate planning. Topics include federal tax law, trust planning, conveyancing, debtor-creditor rights, bankruptcy law, contempt law, international law, and litigation developments that have taken place during the period July 2011-October 2012. NOTE: This course has been approved for Minimum Continuing Legal Education credit by the State Bar of Texas Committee on MCLE in the amount of 1.0 credit hours, of which 0 credit hours will apply to legal ethics/professional responsibility credit.

In this essential program for lawyers practicing asset protection planning and estate planning law, Barry Engel and John Garland of Engel & Reiman pc discuss and analyze several potentially important new decisions, including: • Mortensen, the much-discussed decision by the United States Bankruptcy Court for the District of Alaska and what it really means; • In re Schwarzkopf, in which the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals looks at, and applies, principles of fraudulent transfer law and alter ego in the trust context; • Dexia Credit Local v. Rogan, and the civil and criminal lessons to be learned from the case; and • Beaudin, which highlights important legal distinctions between fraudulent transfers on the one hand, and conversions of property from non-exempt to exempt form, on the other.