Law Offices, John M. Miles

Law Offices, John M. Miles A general practice law office emphasizing business formation and operations and estate planning, coordinating the two with an eye towards asset preservation

This is just too cute!
08/07/2025

This is just too cute!

08/09/2024

Sharing is Caring – Musings

I started this blog last year, intending to post about five hundred words a day. I did well for a while, posting every morning, then I missed a day here and there then a week here and there and lately, the days without a post have far outnumbered those with a posting.

Part of the reason for my not posting is that I have been experiencing exactly what I was writing about when I began this series of posts. I have learned firsthand the value of a Power of Attorney and an Advance Medical Directive. It is one thing to advise people about the value of these documents but quite another to have them at the ready in your portfolio.

Armed with a Power of Attorney and an Advance Directive, you can transfer the ownership of property, have access to bank accounts or investment accounts, and not only monitor the course of medical treatment but steer the direction of the course of treatment.

As I have constantly told my clients after they execute these documents, “These documents have been drafted and signed and I sincerely hope you never have to use them”. However, it is far better to have the documents and not need them than to need them and not have them. Furthermore, as it says in the Good Book, “You know not the day nor the hour”. Debilitating diseases sneak up on you and all of a sudden one day you realize that a Power of Attorney is necessary.

Take a few minutes and visit my blog at JMM316.wordpress.com and go back over a few of my blogs as I address various aspects of estate planning.
Enjoy your day.

John Martin Miles
6050 Eagle Close Lane
Sugar Hill, GA 30518
404-725-7937
[email protected]

08/06/2024

I just had to laugh!

Hard!

05/06/2024

Sharing is Caring - Do it Now!

I’m young, I’m only ### years old. I don’t need a will yet.

I’m young. I’m healthy. I don’t need a medical directive yet.

Both of these trains of thought might be correct. The big question is: when will you need these documents? If you knew the answer to this question, you could wait until the time came and prepare a Will or an advance directive. The problem is: you know not the day nor the hour.

You may suffer a tragic death a be intestate and at the whim of the legislature. You may suffer a debilitating injury and be unable to prepare your will, again leaving your estate in the hands of the legislature.

Remember, it is better to have it and not need it than to need it and not have it. For so long as you are mentally competent, you can change your will as often as you like.

The logic is the same regarding medical directives. You do not know when the need will arise. If the need arises and you do not have a directive, your alternative is guardianship. As I have said several times before, guardianship is cumbersome, time consuming, and expensive.

The best advice is to put your directives and for that matter a general power of attorney in place while you are still competent to prepare them so that they will be there when you need them.

Consult a professional versed in the area of your question.

Enjoy your day.
John Martin Miles
6050 Eagle Close Lane
Sugar Hill, GA 30518
404-725-7937
[email protected]

04/26/2024

Sharing is Caring-Advance Medical Directives - Redux
It used to be that you could take your spouse or adult child to a medical provider, tell the provider what the symptoms were, sit in on the examination, and learn the results. You could also communicate with the provider about changes in the health situation of the patient.

It used to be but is no more. Enter HIPPA, for the protection of the patient. Today you cannot access that information unless the patient has given you permission. A problem is that the need for your intervention often does not arise until the patient is unable to give you permission either because of an advancing illness or a catastrophic event like a car wreck.

Everyone should have an Advance Directive. The Georgia Statutory form provides that it is effective if the principal is unable to make decisions or if the principal specifically enacts the power of the directive.

Everyone should execute an advance directive and keep it in a safe place for the time in the future when it is needed. The alternative to having a directive when you need it is a guardianship which is time-consuming and expensive. Another consideration is that the Advance Directive is “ready to go” as it were. It can take eight to ten weeks after filing to get an order of guardianship. A lot can happen in eight to ten weeks.

Everyone, EVERYONE, should have an Advance Medical Directive.

Consult a professional versed in the area of your question.

Enjoy your day.
John Martin Miles
6050 Eagle Close Lane
Sugar Hill, GA 30518
404-725-7937
[email protected]

04/25/2024

Sharing is Caring – Identify Your Heirs

I took today’s post and asked the artificial intelligence attached to my Microsoft browser to rewrite it as an informational blog. The following is what it produced. I think the result is impersonal and shows no experience.

The Importance of Identifying Heirs in Estate Planning

Estate planning is a crucial process that involves making decisions about who will inherit your assets after you pass away. One of the most important steps in this process is identifying your heirs. Whether you plan to leave them an inheritance or not, knowing who your heirs are and where they are located is essential for several reasons.

Firstly, the law requires that all potential heirs be notified about the probate process. This is a legal procedure that occurs after someone dies, where their will is validated, and their assets are distributed according to their wishes. If an heir is not notified, they could potentially disrupt the probate process by making a claim on the estate.

Secondly, if an heir is not mentioned in the will or their whereabouts are unknown, it can cause significant delays in the probate process. For example, if a grandchild has not been in contact with the family for many years, they still need to be located and informed about the estate, even if the will states they are not to receive anything. This can be a complex and time-consuming task, especially if the heir has a common name or lives in a large city.

Furthermore, if a "lost" heir learns about the estate and decides to make a claim, it can lead to legal challenges that can be costly and time-consuming to defend against. Even if they are not entitled to a share of the estate, the mere act of defending against their claim can deplete the estate's resources.

Therefore, it is imperative for individuals to discuss their family situation with an attorney and take steps to identify all potential heirs. This can include maintaining up-to-date contact information, making provisions for service by publication if necessary, and considering the use of private investigators or other search methods to locate missing heirs.

By taking these precautions, individuals can help ensure that their estate is administered smoothly and according to their wishes, avoiding unnecessary complications for their loved ones during an already difficult time. Remember, sharing is caring, and part of that care involves thorough estate planning.
Consult a professional versed in the area of your question. Trust but verify!

Enjoy your day.
John Martin Miles
6050 Eagle Close Lane
Sugar Hill, GA 30518
404-725-7937
[email protected]

04/25/2024

Sharing is Caring – Identify Your Heirs

When you are talking with an attorney and planning your estate, it is imperative that you identify all of your heirs, whether you want to leave them anything or not.

There are two reasons for this. First, as a part of the process of administering an estate, all of the heirs at law of the deceased have to be notified of the probate process. Second, an undisclosed and unmentioned heir can disrupt the probate process.

I currently have two estates finding their way through probate, but which are moving slowly because of heirs who have disappeared. In one case, the parents were estranged from their daughter. They have a granddaughter whom they have neither seen nor talked to in nearly twenty years. Their daughter pre-deceased them, moving the granddaughter up in the chain of heirs. Since they have been out of touch with their daughter, her location is unknown, but she must be notified. The will says “I don’t leave her anything” but she needs to be notified. During their lifetimes, my clients might have known someone who knew someone so that we could locate the granddaughter. We are currently searching for her and running notice on the legal organ to effectuate service by publication.

In the second case, the man had a son by a prior marriage whose custody was awarded to his mother. My clients think he might have been adopted by his stepfather, but they do not know. The son’s name is a Spanish equivalent of “John Smith”, and he was last known to be in the Miami area. A Google search disclosed nearly a thousand possibilities. Here again, we are jumping through the hoops for service by publication. During his lifetime, the testator could have given his son some hints as to how to find this heir.

The second problem is that the “lost” heir upon learning of the estate might just appear and announce, “Here I am, and I want my share”. The heir may or may not be entitled to a share but defending against his claim is expensive and your heirs might end up throwing some money at the purported heir just to make him go away.

When you are planning your estate think about any possible heirs and deal with them in your will. If you were particularly promiscuous in your youth you might include a clause expressly leaving nothing to any purported heir not expressly provided for in your will.

Consult a professional versed in the area of your question. Trust but verify!

Enjoy your day.
John Martin Miles
6050 Eagle Close Lane
Sugar Hill, GA 30518
404-725-7937
[email protected]

04/24/2024

Sharing is Caring – Artificial Intelligence – Yet A-gain

I continue to whip this horse because there is still information that you need.

Think back to what I told you about what computers can and cannot do.
Q: What can a computer do?
A: Add fast as hell and remember it forever!

To expand this a little further, a computer will do exactly what you tell it to do, nothing more, nothing less. Today, it seems like computers can be programmed to think and answer questions. In fact, the computer does answer your questions, but it does it by accessing a database that is being remembered forever and applying a bunch of “if - then - else” questions to arrive at an answer. The process is complicated by the fact that the computer reduces everything to a binary number, that is, a number with only ones and zeros. How the computer does this remains a mystery.

We have all seen the flow charts that ask a yes-no question and there is an arrow for yes and one for no. Then there is another yes-no question with its arrows and follow-up questions. This continues until the ultimate answer is obtained.

This is what artificial intelligence does when you ask it a question or to produce a document. It asks itself a bunch of yes-no questions based on your request, and it comes up with an answer. Could you have asked the same series of questions and come to the same conclusion? Probably. But remember this, artificial intelligence is utilizing both of the computer’s powers, remembering it forever (accessing its database) and adding fast as hell (performing the if-then-else functions). Back in the day, lawyers did exactly the same thing when conducting legal research. The only difference is that today we are armed with a keyboard. Back then, we were in the library, probably behind a mountain of books as we searched for the right track to the solution.

I had a fellow attorney call me yesterday afternoon. Some of his forms had gotten lost in the ether and he wondered if I had such a form. I was at the doctor’s office and could not check but I suggested he could ask ChatGPT to write the document for him and edit it.

This morning, out of curiosity, I asked ChatGPT to write the document he had requested. In about fifteen seconds, it had produced the document. It was not ready to use but was a good basis to start editing. It was a head start over drafting the document from scratch.

Artificial intelligence is a valuable tool but use it right. Do not use a hammer to shorten a board.

Consult a professional versed in the area of your question. Trust but verify!

Enjoy your day.
John Martin Miles
6050 Eagle Close Lane
Sugar Hill, GA 30518
404-725-7937
[email protected]

04/17/2024

Sharing is Caring – Artificial Intelligence – A-gain

I continue to whip this horse because there is still information that you need.

Perhaps the best advice regarding artificial intelligence is to use it as a tool to do what it is that you do. Do not use it as a tool to do something that you should have someone else do for you.

Suppose you are an engineer and are writing a paper on a subject within your expertise. In that case, you can use artificial intelligence to do some of your research for you and cut down the time necessary to prepare your paper.

If you are an engineer and you want to prepare an employment contract for a new hire, do not use artificial intelligence to write the contract.

The difference is your knowledge base. You can read the artificial intelligence output of the engineering paper based on your engineering expertise and tweak and edit the output so that it is accurate and on point.

When you read the employment contract, you do not have the expertise to know the effect of the words because it is not within your training.

I asked ChatGPT about plagiarism this morning. It answered that artificial intelligence both created plagiarism and was a tool to detect plagiarism. It stressed that it is imperative that you give credit when using verbiage created by someone other than yourself. You also have to consider whether the paper you are preparing will be published. In today’s society, there is a plethora of people who find no greater pleasure than to detect plagiarism in scholarly articles. Artificial intelligence can be utilized to determine whether an article is original or just lifted from another source through artificial intelligence.

It is all right to utilize artificial intelligence to help you write a scholarly paper but always give credit. At the end of the lifted material simply put “(ChatGPT search Biomechanical Engineering)”. Plagiarism is taking someone else’s work and passing it off as one’s own. If you credit your source, no plagiarism.

Remember, if you copy the work of one person, that is plagiarism. If you copy the work of three or more people, that is research. But more importantly, give credit for what you have imported.

The following is what ChatGPT has to say on the subject:
“To avoid plagiarism, it's essential to always cite your sources properly, whether through direct quotation, paraphrasing, or referencing ideas. Giving credit to the original creators demonstrates academic integrity and contributes to the richness of scholarly dialogue by acknowledging the contributions of others.”

Consult a professional versed in the area of your question. Trust but verify!

Enjoy your day.
John Martin Miles
6050 Eagle Close Lane
Sugar Hill, GA 30518
404-725-7937
[email protected]

04/15/2024

Sharing is Caring – Artificial Intelligence

I do not want to keep whipping a dead horse, but Artificial Intelligence is a subject that is at the top of the headlines these days. You must remember this; Artificial Intelligence is a tool and is useful and valuable when used properly. A hammer is a tool, but it is not particularly useful if you want to make a board shorter than it is. For that, you need another tool, a saw. It is good to have artificial intelligence in your toolbox but to know when and how to use it.

In the area of business planning and estate planning, the best use of artificial intelligence is to prepare for your meeting with your professional.

I asked ChatGPT several questions about estate planning, powers of attorney, healthcare directives, business formation, and types of business organizations. The artificial intelligence provided good general answers.

There used to be a consumer advocate who had a show on a local talk radio station. Callers would call in and wait up to 40 minutes on hold while his staff looked up the answer. Then the caller would go on the air and ask their question and the host would give an immediate answer to their question. I said on many occasions that he was the greatest purveyor of lies, half-truths, and misinformation available locally. The answers that he gave were correct in the vacuum that is the caller on the phone but might not be right for a listener in Peoria. So it is with artificial intelligence. The answers are generalized and might need to be altered for the local laws where you live. Think of the questions you want to ask your professional, then ask these questions to the artificial intelligence. This will make the professional’s answers easier to understand.

One last thing, check the effective date of the artificial intelligence database. I used one service that had a 2021 effective date. A lot can happen in three years, lots of appellate decisions, and three legislative sessions.

Consult a professional versed in the area of your question. Trust but verify!

Enjoy your day.
John Martin Miles
6050 Eagle Close Lane
Sugar Hill, GA 30518
404-725-7937
[email protected]

04/11/2024

Sharing is Caring – As Fully and Thoroughly

“The marriage is dissolved as fully and thoroughly as though the parties had never been married.” These are the words that dissolve a marriage in a divorce decree in the state of Georgia.

The specter of divorce always looms on the horizon of every marriage. The Georgia legislature has long recognized that a divorce would affect a party’s testamentary desires. Until the past 15 years or so, the law provided that upon the issuance of a decree of divorce, any will which either party had is void, unless the possibility of divorce was contemplated in the will. The current law has been softened a bit and provides that if the testator gets a divorce, the will will be interpreted as though the other spouse pre-deceased the testator.

When I used to do divorce work, one point I always raised was n=the necessity of making a new will as well as health care directives and powers of attorney.

In preparing your will, you need to consider bequests to your children and stepchildren, if any. If you get a divorce and have minor children, your bequest to them might be defeated. Upon your death, your former spouse, as the biological parent will get custody of the children. In these circumstances, a bequest to the children might be delivered to your former spouse as their custodial parent and it may or may not be used for the children’s benefit. This is even though a bequest to your former spouse is invalidated by the statute.

Your will should provide that a bequest to a minor child shall be delivered to a named individual as trustee for the child.

This again circles back to the question that has permeated these posts, “What could possibly go wrong with this?”

Consult a professional versed in the area of your question. Trust but verify!

Enjoy your day.
John Martin Miles
6050 Eagle Close Lane
Sugar Hill, GA 30518
404-725-7937
[email protected]

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6050 Eagle Close Lane
Sugar Hill, GA
30518

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