Estate Planning, Probate & Elder Law Attorneys

» Update #1: Anna Nicole Smith

I blogged about this case previously (here and here). As this article notes, Ms. Smith's daughter Dannielynn has been named her sole heir.

The interesting issue raised here is this: if you specifically disinherit someone (as Ms. Smith did -- her Will excludes descendants born after its execution), but your Will winds up not listing any valid beneficiaries (thereby creating an intestacy, with your heirs inheriting your property), can the person you disinherited take as an heir? One approach might be to consider Ms. Smith's heirs, but exclude as heirs anyone specifically disinherited in the Will. I believe that would leave Ms. Smith's mother as her sole heir. Of course, there is an inherent unfairness involved here -- should an individual be able to disinherit their minor child?

» The AIR's Knocked Out of Alkermes
Alkermes initiates a round of cost-cutting.

» Gilead Not Slowing
Gilead gets a new approval for a drug.

» The Case Against Small Caps
Here's an easier way to make money.

» Down to "The Wire"

I have praised "The Wire" before (here and here) -- I think it's the best thing I've ever seen on TV. Tonight is the series finale. It will probably be impossible to understand what's going on if you are new to the show, but there's always DVD.

"The Wire" isn't a law show per se -- although the show does touch on legal institutions -- but its creator and some of its writers have taken a unique legal position (known as jury nullification) in this article in Time magazine:

If asked to serve on a jury deliberating a violation of state or federal drug laws, we will vote to acquit, regardless of the evidence presented. Save for a prosecution in which acts of violence or intended violence are alleged, we will — to borrow Justice Harry Blackmun's manifesto against the death penalty — no longer tinker with the machinery of the drug war. No longer can we collaborate with a government that uses nonviolent drug offenses to fill prisons with its poorest, most damaged and most desperate citizens.