The Firm secured a voluntary discontinuance today of breach of fiduciary duty claims brought in the Supreme Court of New York (Westchester County) against one of the Firm’s life insurance clients in connection with disbursements the client made under multiple life insurance policies valued in excess of $4 million. The life policies were purchased by a pension plan and trust and later transferred to a second trust (“Second Trust”) before the client disbursed the policies’ surrender values in accordance with directions it received from the grantor of the Second Trust. The Firm secured the discontinuance, pre-answer and before having to engage in any discovery, following a painstaking showing that the disbursements were entirely appropriate under the terms of the Second Trust and a related divorce decree that afforded the grantor of the Second Trust the right to terminate existing trustees and appoint successor trustees who then had authority to surrender the policies.
