Samantha E. Weissbluth

Senior Counsel
Foley & Lardner LLP

Samantha E. Weissbluth is senior counsel at the Chicago office of Foley & Lardner LLP, concentrating her practice in the area of estate and trust litigation. Her practice encompasses all aspects of estate and trust litigation, including breach of fiduciary duty issues, judicial constructions of wills and trusts, will and trust contests, tax litigation, contested heirship, adoption and paternity issues, charitable pledge disputes, guardianship matters, estate planning malpractice, and wrongful-death actions. She also has significant experience in estate and trust administration and guardianship issues. She is a coauthor of two chapters in IICLE®’s ESTATE, TRUST, AND GUARDIANSHIP LITIGATION. She is also the editor of a quarterly Foley & Lardner LLP newsletter entitled Legal News: Estate and Trust Litigation. Ms. Weissbluth’s professional activities and affiliations include membership in the American, Illinois State, and Chicago Bar Associations and the Chicago Community Trust. She received both her B.A. and her J.D. from Northwestern University.

Articles by Samantha E. Weissbluth
Posthumously Conceived Children And Their Survivor Benefit
State law results in schizophrenic decisionsfrom the Ninth Circuit and a lesson for us all
Protect Trust Assets in Bankruptcy
Pre-petition disclaimers can help save the day
Philanthropy or Spite?
The wild case of a $50 million donation that could be the largest in Panama’s history
Court Leaves Florida Elderly Vulnerable
Inconsistent application of undue influence protection puts seniors at risk
Stung by the Slayer Statute
You don’t often see states’ slayer statutes invoked. We encounter them only rarely in our practice, and when we do, it’s in cases that generally go unreported.
Barred by Lunatics Law
How a preexisting substituted judgment order can preclude posthumous challenges to a will in California (and possibly elsewhere): the lesson of Murphy v. Murphy
Amend the Amendment Clause
A few simple changes can make revocable trusts a tad less flexible so that your clients’ beneficiaries aren’t dragged into post-mortem legal wrangling
Corporate Trustees Beware
Disappointed heirs lose their case against a bank -- but look at how much convincing the court needed
Negative Energy Haunts the House of Ken Lay
Disgraced former Enron CEO Kenneth L. Lay is dead and cremated, but prosecutors are still pursuing his assets
Sunshine State Welcomes Deadbeats
Florida apparently is a haven even for those who deliberately dodge existing creditors
Three Hots and a Cot
Can a trustee withhold distributions because a beneficiary is incarcerated? Should states follow Connecticut's lead and force prisoners to pony up for the cost of keeping them?
That Do-It-Yourself Spirit in Big Sky Country
In a surprising decision from the Montana Supreme Court, we find that landscape isn't the only thing that's wide open in that jurisdiction. Consider, for example, the case of Stanton v. Wells Fargo Bank Mont. N.A., 2007 MT 22 (Jan. 30, 2007).
Who's in Charge?
In the context of an invalid appointment of a successor trustee, the Oregon appellate court in Allen Trust Co. v. Cowlitz Bank, 152 P.3d 974 (Or. Ct. App. 2007) recently grappled with the question of what it means to be a "trustee de facto" -- and what kinds of fees and attorney expenses such a trustee might demand.
Beware the Power of Attorney 
Lawyers get requests for powers of attorney all the time, and they're easy to churn out and then forget. But beware. Powers of attorney also are very
Attorneys' Fees
Some wags who practice in the Probate Division here in Chicago say an estate is only “fully probated” when it has been fully eaten up by lawyers’ fees in litigation or other legal matters. For the literary, such quips bring to mind Jarndyce v. Jarndyce in Charles Dickens’ novel, Bleak House, lampooning the 19th century English chancery courts.
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