Brian F. Mahoney, Estate Planning & Asset Protection Attorney

Brian F. Mahoney, Estate Planning & Asset Protection Attorney Since 1982, Attorney Brian Mahoney has worked with Families of all ages and elderly persons,children, disabled adults, and business owners. Law Offices Brian F.

Attorney Mahoney has helped score of clients to safeguard millions since 1982. Attorney Mahoney has written numerous legal articles for the National Academy of Elder Law Attorneys, a nationwide association of over 4,000 attorneys whose mission is the protection of Elders and the Disabled of any age and for the Wealth Counsel, a nationwide association of over 1,000 Estate Planning Attorneys. Past a

rticles include: Nursing Home Problems Facing Residents and their Families; the Irrevocable Income Only Trust (Medicaid); Special Needs Trusts and Allowable Expenditures; Representing Learning Disabled Children and Child Protection Planning. Also, he has written many local articles for the Canton Citizen Newspaper and Canton MOMS club. Attorney Mahoney conducts annual legal seminars at MIT. Brian is working on a series of books including a Divorce Manual for the layperson as well as a Child Safety Manual for parents. Attorney Mahoney is also working on a book discussing the truths and misconceptions about the practice of law to help law students decide what area of law they would like to pursue. On a personal note, Attorney Mahoney is the proud father of 19-year-old daughter Bettina, a double major in Dance and Psychology at Dean College. He is the former host of a live talk show “Estate Planning,” and "A Senior Moment," on 95.9 FM, WATD. Brian loves the water and is a member of the Next-Dimension sail racing team. Current hobbies include photography, snow skiing, snowshoeing, scuba diving and travel. Attorney Mahoney has hundreds of satisfied clients. Let Brian put his team to work for you and your family today. Mahoney Canton and Dedham

Please contact us with further inquiries:

Office number: 781-828-0083

Our Office Locations:

Canton Office Addresses: 1209 Washington Street, Canton, MA 02021

Dedham Office: 30 Eastbrook Road, Dedham, MA 02026

www.attybrianmahoney.com

09/09/2022

Life Expectancy: Hi. American life expectancy has dropped over the past couple of years to age 76. This means that when someone is born now, they can expect to live 76 years (the lowest it's been since the year 1996). There's a lot that goes into that calculation. Death can happen many ways including illness and accidents. It's all factored in. At the turn of the 20th century, life expectancy was only 47 years in the US.

Back then in 1900, there wasn't a lot of job safety or safety equipment. There were no antibiotics. People would swiftly die from acute diseases and now of course we typically don't (Covid being a glaring example of that outlier). Instead we tend to suffer today from lingering, long-term illnesses that may disable us but not kill us right away. It's a different environment. Over the past 122 years going back to 1900, our life expectancy gained 29 years.

Folks are living longer now. That is great if it comes with health and money. People can easily outlast their money. Many retired or elderly folks want me to safeguard certain assets with an Irrevocable Income Only Trust in case they need a Nursing Facility residence, so they can save assets for their children. You cannot directly access all assets placed into such a trust so I always caution folks to think about whether they may need those assets to live off some day. I caution clients to overestimate their monthly expenses and underestimate their expected monthly income when determining whether you might need an asset in the future.

In other words, it's nice to want to protect an asset for your children, but since people are living longer and longer, we have to make sure you will have enough assets to live off for the rest of your life. This could be longer than you think.

A lot of folks want to put burial & funeral instructions into their last Will. But it is very typical for no one to look at someone's last Will for weeks after their passing. Why not? When someone dies there's the shock, the grieving, having arrangements taken care of and trying to figure out what to do next. There are so many things to do and think about that most people don't get to the money part until you have time to catch your breath in a new reality where someone you love is gone.

Therefore, a Will is not the greatest place to put burial & funeral instructions because no one will typically see the Will for weeks after the burial or cremation.

I tell clients I will put such information in their last Will and I will also put it into their Letter of Instructions which I give to every estate planning client after we complete their important documents. The Letter of Instructions details everything we did and what needs to be done and will include burial & funeral instructions.

I also believe it's very important to inform your spouse, your children or your significant other what your choices are. No one likes to talk about death, but typically this only takes one or two conversations. It’s good for the people who will be there after you to know what you want.

Some folks don't want a public wake. Some folks want to be cremated. Others may want to have a celebration of their life, but not right after they die, maybe weeks later to give people a chance to come in from out of state or to plan it properly.

I will make sure your documents reflect your wishes. But the one thing I want to stress, and I learned this from a prominent local funeral director back in the 1980’s, and that is: wakes, funerals and celebrations of life are meant for your family members who remain, because it allows them to grieve and to vent their emotions.

Thank you for reading. I hope you can get outside on this September weekend.

Thanks.

Best,

Brian

07/29/2022

Look back!

I am working on a new will for one of my longtime clients who is now 101. You wouldn't know how old she was while talking with her over the phone. She is sharp as a tack.

She will break the record for me, as my oldest client signing a legal document.

Another client in her mid-80s called me about Medicaid nursing home planning.

Whatever you have done must be done 5 years before the need arises for a nursing facility and Medicaid. That is called the look back period.

Some folks have adequate amounts of long-term care insurance. This insurance can safeguard their home, without more. The vast majority of people do not have long-term care insurance. Primarily because it's very, very expensive.

If you are married, and one spouse goes into the nursing facility, the home can be transferred into the name of the well spouse which lawyers call the community spouse.

The home would be protected in that case unless the well spouse needed to go into a nursing facility or passed away. But if they had a savvy elder law/estate planning attorney and the well spouse leaves the home in a Special Needs Trust within his/her last Will, then the home would be protected.

The adult child of one of my recently deceased clients came in this week to go over trusts. It is sometimes frustrating for the lay person to try to read legal documents.
Honestly, lawyers don't write documents so that clients can understand them. We write them so they will be legally effective, enforceable and achieve the goals that clients want to meet.

I am working on a trustee manual that I intend to offer clients and/or their families to purchase in the future which helps explain what they need to do if they become the trustee. It's a lot of work to be a trustee, but it's worth it. Trusts can save estate taxes, avoid nursing home issues, provide inheritance protection to children, and they can avoid living and death probate. This would save families thousands of dollars and years of time and stress.

Please keep in mind, if you have any questions about documents that I've prepared for you, I am happy to answer them. Just give me a call or shoot me an email.

I hope you have a good weekend and can get outside under our beautiful summer skies and enjoy mother nature.

Thank you for reading best thank you Brian

07/16/2022

Who to choose? Who should you appoint as your trustee when you are gone? Who should you appoint as your Health Care Agent or Power of Attorney if you are single or your spouse has passed? Some parents want to include all of their children so no one feels left out. Others pick the oldest child. Some select the one who went to Business School.
You don't need to have a popularity contest because when you're gone, you will be, as lawyers say, "outside the jurisdiction,” and will not hear any complaints!
I recently re-zoomed with a new client and after our discussion she named her daughter as her Health Care agent because she is dependable, caring and would strive to make the right decision. Her son is to be her Power of Attorney because his is organized and has a good business mind. She named them both as jointly serving trustees because her son lives out of state. It will be good for them to have some boots on the ground when they go to sell the property and as a co-trustee Massachusetts resident, the sister can help.
When they sell their mom’s home, the daughter can readily go into the home to make repairs, meet the real estate agent, etc. Since the brother is a good guy, but can be a tad rigid, the daughter will now have a say also.
When making a selection, I always start with the altruism test. Who is the one person you can count on to do what you want them to do? Who wouldn't run roughshod over family members?
Then I would list the skills needed for a certain position to determine if the trusted person has the ability to get that job done. Maybe one child is good for one task and another child can handle the other task. A Health Care agent who will help you with medical decisions does not need to have the same skill set as a Power of Attorney who pays your bills.
Also it depends on age. A lot of people want to name their parents or grandparents, because of their wisdom and experience which is a great notion. If they are in their late 70’s or early 80’s, can they handle the extra stress and work?
Some people are too young! I would never recommend appointing anyone under 25 if possible because they lack life experience.
Also, naming a California resident as your health care agent may not make much sense because you’ll need someone nearby in Massachusetts to make emergency medical decisions.
The number one problem in Estate Planning is procrastination! Good enough is good enough. You can always amend your selections in the future.
I hope you have a great weekend. I'm looking forward to a dip in the ocean this week down on the cape. I hope to hit the national seashore in the morning with ice cold water and then shoot over to the Bayside for some warmer water so we can linger in the water a little bit. There is probably far less great white sharks on the Bayside as opposed to national seashore beaches, although a shark was spotted this week at Horseneck beach which surprised me.
Thanks for reading, best, Brian

07/01/2022

"They don't want cures they want customers."

This week's title comes from a physician who is among many doctors that were recently asked for their opinion on the pharmaceutical industry. One doctor's opinion of big pharma was "They don't want cures they want customers."

Speaking of the unethical, our politicians want us to live the way they think we should but then they live the way they want to. Look at John Kerry the so-called climate czar. He flies around the world in a private plane, where one flight from the east coast of the USA to Europe probably eats up more gas than I drive in 2 years. But he's so important to the safety of the world that he can fly on his own. What? I expect a politician to wait in line and go through TSA with the commoners. It’s like telling everyone that we need to be vegetarians while eating a hamburger.

And the latest example of special treatment in a criminal case for a politically connected person comes from the great state of California (gee there's a shock. It's hard to imagine a crooked politician coming from that state isn't it?).

I was reading about Paul Pelosi, who was involved in a motor vehicle accident in Napa Valley, California. He was in his Porsche and blew a .08 on the breathalyzer.

He’s not too concerned about the environment just like his wife Nancy that is driving around in a fast German sports car (where’s the Prius Paul?). It took them about 1 month to decide to charge him with driving under the influence of alcohol. If you or I we're in a traffic accident and blew a .08 on the breathalyzer, do you know how long it would take California Highway Patrol to decide whether to charge us with driving under the influence? About 1 minute. I also read a report that the district attorney in California highway patrol refused to give out any information on the arrest, citing in part “an ongoing investigation.”

I've worked on operating under the influence cases in Massachusetts (that's what we call them here, OUI). Trust me, there’s not a lot to investigate. How do you spell Cover up? White wash? Special treatment?

Does anybody remember the book by George Orwell called Animal Farm? The animals wanted to form their own society and ultimately everyone was equal but then later on some were "more equal than others."

Remember years ago when people would say if you don't like it, write your congressman?

I think it helps. The more noise we make the better. It's almost the 4th of July and if our founding fathers continued to take the abuse from the hypocritical British rulers then where would we be today? Our complacency will doom us. Our blind allegiance to the left or to the right will also contribute to our downfall. We all know right from wrong, yet too often we excuse those on “our side,” by saying “well your guy did this or your guy was worse.” It doesn't matter what my guy did if your guy is wrong. Do mothers today not teach their children anymore that two wrongs don't make a right?

I hope everyone has a great Fourth of July weekend. I had been wondering where May went now June is almost gone too. Does time fly by for you too?

I hope you can get outside this holiday weekend.

Thank you for reading, best, Brian

06/24/2022

Welcome summer 2022!!
I hope you have an active and healthy summer of 2022. We only get so many summers in our lifetime. I hope you can enjoy the beach, woods, golf courses, mountains, or dining al fresco in the city; whatever floats your boat. I hope you can partake and enjoy.

NASA recently announced it was cutting down some power on the Voyager 1 and Voyager 2. These probes were launched within months of each other back in 1977. I was but 20 years old then. I remember one of my professors talking about it while I was a student at Northeastern University in Boston when they were launched.

Voyager 1 is almost 14 billion miles away from us in interstellar space while Voyager 2 is 12 billion miles away. As Johnny Carson would have quipped "At $5 a gallon we couldn't afford to make that trip now."

If we were smart enough to engineer such an extraordinarily successful trip, why can't we produce more affordable vehicles? Why can’t we produce transportation and airplanes that don't pollute?

Those probes were needed to last 5 years and they have lasted 45 years. What products are made now that last 9 times longer than expected? Again as Johnny Carson might have quipped "The only thing that lasts longer than the Voyager probes are politicians in Washington." That certainly is unfortunate.

Speaking of politicians and other rodents, I have favored term limits my entire life. One of my favorite all-time hypocrites (most of my choices are politicians btw) is Marty ME-han, who ran on term limits for congress. Once elected, Marty decided he liked the power and prestige of Washington and decided "Term limits? Nah."

If we can't get term limits could we get an age limit? Can I get an amen? Our state has a mandatory retirement at age 70 for everyone employed by the state except for politicians. Funny isn't it how politicians tell us what to do but they don't do it themselves.

Admittedly 70 might be a tad young for politician age limits but what about 75? Certainly 80.

The only good thing that comes to mind that Massachusetts politicians have done that benefits the public cheaply is the Homestead. Homestead protects our homes in case we are sued for up to $500,000 for a mere filing fee of $36. What else have they done? Let me know, I need some help on that one.

Speaking of age, and admittedly I'm not a huge fan of his, but I am duly impressed by Paul McCartney. He did two sold out shows, two nights in a row last week at Fenway Park at the age of 80. His shows were a very generous two and a half hours long. Now that's a strong vigorous 80-year-old man! Doing that at his age with a bass guitar strapped around his neck for most of the night, standing while playing and singing. Now that's impressive. Talk about being blessed, what a life he's had.

Please remember that I am open for your referrals of your family, friends, neighbors, colleagues and fellow employees.

Thank you as always for reading. I hope you can get outside under our early summer skies and walk, hike, bike, kayak, row, swim, water ski, or sail. Those are my favorite outdoor summer time activities. What are yours?

Best, Brian

06/17/2022

As many of you know, I had been sick for a very, very long time from long COVID-19. It temporarily ruined my life for the better part of 19 months. I thought to myself on occasion when sick that I had a big problem, trust me, but what kept me from whining “poor me,” is the fact so many others had it so much worse. We went to a client’s home to complete her Will, this week. She is suffering from Parkinson's disease. The poor lady was eager, gracious and still had her sense of humor but could barely hold a pen to write her name. Signing the documents tired her out completely and we had to leave swiftly because of it. What a strong person. And my problems with covid, though significant, pale in comparison to hers.

One of my “travel,” witnesses who was with us on that visit (Wills require 2 witnesses FYI) lost her 77-year-old husband to leukemia three years ago. They had known each other since they were children. And we think we have problems?

Millions upon millions of people in Ukraine have had their homes destroyed. Infants have been r***d. Too many people are being tortured. Many tens of thousands murdered by the Russian aggressors. And do some of us still think we have problems?

If you do have a problem, Ie late for work, flat tire, money issues etc and it's not life or death then maybe it's not so bad and you can deal with it in a reasonable manner. There will be better days and blue skies to come. As a lawyer for 40 years, if no one died, no one is in danger, no one has been arrested and no one lost their job, then is it really and emergency? Then I try to relax clients. It can be dealt with, and placed into perspective.

After Japan attacked Pearl Harbor, an Admiral spoke to the men and said this could’ve been worse when no one thought it could’ve been any worse, it was devastating with the about 2,500 men killed and many more horrifically injured and burned. He pointed out that the Japanese missed a huge fuel depot and bombing that would have added greatly to the destruction and death and because their cowardly attack came on a Sunday morning, many men were at mass and not on the ships and so the mere timing of the attack saved hundreds if not thousands of more lives.

If your doctor tells you not buy green bananas, then I am truly sorry to hear that and may you live out your days in dignity and peace, while being proud of your accomplishments.

I hope everyone has a great weekend and can get outside under our late spring New England skies.

Best, Brian

06/10/2022

Good afternoon. 40 years ago, I graduated from Suffolk Law School on Beacon Hill in Boston.

Out of my close law school friends, Jude became an excellent trial lawyer. He once settled a medical malpractice case for the policy limits of $1 million dollars after one mistrial and a subsequent jury trial which he obviously won. He has an excellent track record in the court system. Steve is now retired. He had worked for himself representing criminal defendants.John was an assistant district attorney in Suffolk County before working for an insurance defense firm for a while. He now runs his own law practice.Len began his own cleaning company. He also bought distressed property and rehabbed them. He is doing fine.Paul became an assistant district attorney, then a criminal defense attorney. He finally became a professional comedian.

Another friend Tom, eventually joined the Air Force and became a Captain. He represented servicemen and women accused of crimes before military tribunals. He was stationed in Arkansas, then Spain and now lives in Phoenix, Arizona. The rest of us live pretty close to where we grew up. Typical Bostonians.

Suffolk Law School was a great school. 40 years is a lot of water under the bridge, isn't it? I began law school in 1979 after graduating from Northeastern University, another great school. When I was a student, Northeastern University was the largest private university in the entire country for enrollment.

When I graduated in 1982, jobs were hard to come by. I worked for a collection lawyer for 2 weeks before I quit. It was a horrible job for a horrible boss. I worked for a well-known trial lawyer in Lawrence for a short while. He was a walking malpractice case waiting to happen. I quit that job after a district court judge said "What's a nice young man like you doing working for a guy like that? "

Then I worked for a great bunch of guys who were really good lawyers in Boston. I worked there for a year, then I hung out my shingle in April of 1985 and rented my first office in Dedham. My desk was a table I borrowed from my sister. My chair was one of my mother's dining room chairs. Believe it or not, I had a dark brown $9.95 telephone from Radio Shack. Remember them? I outlasted them.

Like most new lawyers on their own, I specialized in whatever walked through the door with the prospect of getting paid. I haven't seen it all, but I've seen quite a bit. I have a damn good “built in lie detector.” I can spot bu****it while blindfolded from a hundred feet away.

I drafted my first Will in 1980 while working as a law clerk. I won my first jury trial in 1983. I won my last jury trial in 2016. I'm deeply proud of having supported myself and my family over these many years. I could have made a ton of money working for a big corporation. I just couldn't accept the fact that someone was going to tell me what to do and when. I had to work for myself. The joke on me is little did I know so many years ago, that you are more of a slave working for yourself than working for someone else. That's okay. I am mentally tough. I am resilient and I never, ever give up.

Here's to the next 40 years! Thank you for reading as always and have a great weekend, best, Brian

06/03/2022

Can I disinherit my deadbeat relative?

Sure you can. The only person you cannot disinherit completely in Massachusetts would be a spouse who is entitled to a certain statutory share of your estate. You can't
stop anyone from suing your estate but you can keep them from winning. And they may have to pay the legal fees of your estate to defend a 'bogus," claim.

The most solid way to do this is if you say ‘I intentionally exclude XX from my Trust or from my Will. He/she is presumed to have pre deceased me under this document for all intents and purposes while leaving no descendants.’ A couple of clients have said that language is too harsh but it does the job if that's what you wanted to do.

Certainly, you should be able to leave your property to whomever you want to and ensure that it doesn't go to someone that you don't want it to ever go to. Where possible, try to avoid Probate and reduce payments to the Massachusetts Department of Revenue regarding estate tax.

Some people have no one to leave their property to. In this case, I always suggest to the client to consider leaving assets to a charity.

Sometimes nasty people have no one to leave it to. Leona Helmsley was called "the queen of mean," (remember her?) and she left $12 million to her dog, out of a $5 billion dollar estate. She did 19 months in federal prison and two months on home arrest based in part on having made a statement that her housekeeper overheard to the effect of "Rich people don't pay taxes little people do." I guess the housekeeper's testimony at a tax evasion trial didn't exactly help the Queen.

Can you imagine being so incredibly wealthy but so very, very twisted that you go out of your way to cheat the government and it cost you 19 months of your life in jail? I don't care how easy a federal jail might be. Wow. 19 months. She had few friends. She was estranged from her grandchildren. In the early 2000’s and on, she actually made some very generous charitable donations in NYC and left $5 million to two of her grandchildren. Her other two grandchildren, who were left out of her Will, contested her Will by saying she was not of sound mind at the time and the 2 estranged grandchildren won. They got $5 million each.

We want to make sure that we get all of our important documents in place before we or our parents get too old or cognitively impaired and are unable to execute legal documents.

Some folks who really, really want to make sure that their Estate plan is to be honored, often make videos. If they sound lucid and appear lucid then it's a great thing to have. Today we can make a video in 5 minutes on our phones. It's simple and I am an excellent videographer.

The video would be scripted as far as the procedures that would be followed. Questions would be asked by me to the client in the video. We would review the questions in advance and also review the procedures.

If someone really needed to solidify their documents, they could even undergo a medical exam and sign the documents when they got out of that doctor's office.

My goal is to make sure that my clients’ wishes are put into legal effect. Right or wrong, black, white or grey, my clients are entitled to their choices. I try never to interfere with that. It's not my place.

My favorite saying is, “It is up to you to decide whether you want chocolate or vanilla, not me. Then I will ensure that you get chocolate or vanilla in your legal documents.”

I hope you had a good Memorial Day weekend. Here’s to looking at a great summer up ahead. I am hoping the drought in Massachusetts doesn’t portend a rainy summer. If you go out this weekend under our late spring skies, please do a sun dance for us.

As always thank you very much for reading. Make it a great weekend. Best, Brian

05/26/2022

Good afternoon: I constantly preach that everyone should have a health care proxy and a power of attorney so they can avoid “living probate”.

Let me explain what that really means.

If you don't have a healthcare proxy and medical treatment is needed, then you need to seek a guardianship in the probate court in the county where the disabled person resides.

If the disabled person lacks a power of attorney and you need to sign them into a nursing home or apply for Medicaid / MassHealth and you need to conduct business for them, such as paying their bills, access to their checking account, etc then you need to seek a conservatorship in Probate Court.

In order to start that process, you need to have a medical report on the form promulgated by state government, and issued pursuant to the Massachusetts probate code aka the MPC.

That means you need to have a qualified healthcare provider write such a report and hopefully examine the person or if they have seen the person fairly recently and know them fairly well, they have to write the report. The report has to indicate that there is a need for a conservator or guardian or both.

It is very difficult to get doctors to write reports for any type of client whether it's a client who's been injured in a car accident or an industrial accident or who wants to apply for SSDI. Doctors don't like to write reports. They only want to do what they specialize in.

So that's the first big hurdle. Then the court will typically assign a lawyer for the disabled person because they are not going to trust you outright. Why would they? They don't know you. There's a ton of fraud going on in our world.

Often a nursing facility will apply for these positions appointing someone that they regularly work for. Whose best interest do you think that person has? The disabled person or the nursing home?

Sometimes they'll appoint a guardian ad litem to investigate the need for a conservator or a guardian.

And yes, the appointed lawyer and GAL do not work for free either.

Typically the courts mark up a hearing within the first 3 months to see if a temporary guardian or conservator is viable.

There are so many “T”s to cross and “I”s to dot in this process that it can fall apart at any time.

God help you if you need emergency action because the probate courts are so swamped, so understaffed and some of them are in complete disarray. Many of them are impossible to reach on the phone.

I called one Probate Court recently and I was put on hold. I was number 16. It was easier for me and less stressful to drive to the probate court and go in person because it was near my office.

Fees and cost to obtain a guardianship or conservator could easily exceed $5,000.

That is why I tell everyone to have a healthcare proxy and a comprehensive power of attorney.

If you go to buy a car, they aren't all the same are they? Some cost more. Some cost less. What you really want is a car that's crash-worthy, gets decent gas mileage, looks okay and has some staying power, meaning it won't fall apart at 80,000 miles.

Not all legal documents are the same either. I've been drafting Powers of Attorney and Health Care proxy documents as an attorney since 1982. My documents are comprehensive, effective and will work when needed.

Thank you for reading and as always. I hope you can get outside this weekend.

Please remember all of the veterans who died to keep our democracy alive on this Memorial Day weekend. Without the sacrifice of our soldiers where would we be?

I also call on you to promote democracy, free speech, free discourse, oppose censorship, oppose unfair tactics by either party and to try to listen sometimes to another person's position because you might learn something that you didn't already know.

My two cents from the cheap seats. Have a great weekend everyone best, Brian

05/20/2022

Boring Trial, slimy people:

Everyone asks me what I think of the Johnny Depp / Amber Heard trial.

My initial reaction when I heard of the lawsuit was that Johnny Depp is a fool. Why would anyone volunteer for 6 weeks in court with their ex nearby? He has enough money for 10 lifetimes already. He alleges he lost work because of her derogatory comments. How many Hollywood producers do you think read the editorials of the Washington Post before making decisions on movies?

All he had to do was wait a couple more years like Kevin Spacey and the offers would have come flooding in again. Hollywood has never had a soul or religion unless you call the worship of money and greed a religion. And yes, that's right Kevin Spacey is working again. On several projects.

I did watch some of the trial just to see what the fuss was about and it was like sitting outside and watching grass grow.

The one section I saw was part of the Cross examination of Heard by Depp's lawyer who I thought took way too much time in between questions and it was exceedingly boring. My impression was she needed to pick up the pace. Cross-examination should be brisk. After so many allegations, Ie of her defecating in his bed and hitting him with a bottle and she alleges many nasty things against him, including drug addiction and alcoholism, well, how did Depp ever figure he'd come out of the trial better then he went into it?

The only reason most people's dirty laundry comes out is when they are in a divorce and typically neither one of them wants the divorce trial. It's typically in a probate court with no one watching and even then it's painful. How Depp ever thought this would help him is beyond me. To my mind litigation should always be a last resort. It takes away too long, it takes way too much work, it's very expensive and you never know what a jury will do.

In this stressful world we have rampant inflation, gas prices are hitting record highs, baby formula shortages believe it or not in the United States in the year 2022, nuclear war threats from that moron in Russia, China is doing invasion drills re Taiwan, still covid issues, people lashing out at anyone who dares to think differently from them and politicians on both sides who have one goal, no I'm sorry, they have two goals, the first is to keep in power, the second is to humiliate the other side and somewhere after picking up their dry cleaning is: "help America out."

Why would Mr. Depp think anyone would particularly care about his problems as a relatively young man and a multi-millionaire?

A lawyer friend of mine says he can foresee a judgment for both parties for a dollar each.

Today I have new clients coming in to review and sign their documents including a realty Trust for their home to avoid death probate, Healthcare Proxies and Powers of Attorney to avoid living probate, Wills of course, 2 Trusts to reduce Massachusetts estate taxes, avoid death probate and provide inheritance protection for their children and lastly, Retirement Plan trusts to provide for inheritance protection for their 3 children.

Recently we've completed documents for two clients who were undergoing surgery, and they were worried about what would happen if they didn't make it.

Those are the types of concerns I typically have. I worry about the health and safety of people around me, not some mega rich, egocentric look at me, out of touch celebrities like Depp and Heard.

I know people are drawn to train wrecks and some go to auto races to see a crash but to me as a lawyer over a lifetime, the Depp Heard trial is not entertainment. There's no important underlying issue, neither one of them are much to look at in the courtroom and it's boring as hell. The lawyers are adequate at best. Gerry Spence they are not.

I always say I hope you can get outside this weekend but it seems like it's going to be quite hot, in the 90s. Maybe you can sneak out at 7:00 a.m. when it's still cool, when the sun's not high and go for a walk under our spring skies.

Thank you as always for reading, best, Brian

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Canton, MA
02021

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Since 1982, Attorney Brian Mahoney has worked with Families of all ages and elderly persons,children, disabled adults, and business owners. Attorney Mahoney has helped score of clients to safeguard millions since 1982. Attorney Mahoney has written numerous legal articles for the National Academy of Elder Law Attorneys, a nationwide association of over 4,000 attorneys whose mission is the protection of Elders and the Disabled of any age and for the Wealth Counsel, a nationwide association of over 1,000 Estate Planning Attorneys. Past articles include: Nursing Home Problems Facing Residents and their Families; the Irrevocable Income Only Trust (Medicaid); Special Needs Trusts and Allowable Expenditures; Representing Learning Disabled Children and Child Protection Planning. Also, he has written many local articles for the Canton Citizen Newspaper and Canton MOMS club. Attorney Mahoney conducts annual legal seminars at MIT. Brian is working on a series of books including a Divorce Manual for the layperson as well as a Child Safety Manual for parents. Attorney Mahoney is also working on a book discussing the truths and misconceptions about the practice of law to help law students decide what area of law they would like to pursue. On a personal note, Attorney Mahoney is the proud father of 19-year-old daughter Bettina, a double major in Dance and Psychology at Dean College. He is the former host of a live talk show “Estate Planning,” and "A Senior Moment," on 95.9 FM, WATD. Brian loves the water and is a member of the Next-Dimension sail racing team. Current hobbies include photography, snow skiing, snowshoeing, scuba diving and travel. Attorney Mahoney has hundreds of satisfied clients. Let Brian put his team to work for you and your family today. Law Offices Brian F. Mahoney Canton and Dedham Please contact us with further inquiries: Office number: 781-828-0083 Canton Office Addresses: 1209 Washington Street, Canton, MA 02021 Dedham Office: 30 Eastbrook Road, Dedham, MA 02026 www.attybrianmahoney.com