Best Lawyers Near You in Chicago, Illinois for Trusts and Estates
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Contact UsRichard (Dick) A. Lang delivers the Firm’s wide array of legal services to many of the wealthiest individuals and families in the United States. He concentrates on wealth transfer and income tax planning for venture capital and entrepreneurial clients, as well as counseling for family offices. Read full biography: https://www.mwe.com/people/lang-richard-a/
Bobbi J. Bierhals has built her practice by developing creative and customized solutions for her clients. Her experience centers on tax and business planning for high-net-worth individuals and families. Her clients range from executives and first-generation entrepreneurs to multi-generational families, with net worth from $40 million to many billions of dollars, and include a number of individuals listed in the Forbes 400. Bobbi’s breadth of experience across a wide range of client prof...
Kate Scallan maintains an international trusts and estates practice, representing clients across the globe in high net worth estate and gift tax planning matters. Kate provides sophisticated tax advice to some of the most successful hedge fund and private equity fund principals in the world. She advises with regard to closely held business planning and tax structuring, bringing her personal touch and attention to each client’s unique situation. Kate’s practice encompasses wills, t...
Peter S. Coorlas is a senior associate of the Chicago law firm Peck Ritchey, LLC . Peter was an Assistant State’s Attorney for Cook County for 30 years, serving in the Special Litigation and Municipal Litigation Sections of the Civil Actions Bureau. Although Peter served in various areas while at the State’s Attorneys Office, he has primarily represented the interests of Cook County in probate matters, spending much of his time on contested litigation, including will contests, con...
Jesse A. Footlik is a Partner with Peck Ritchey, LLC. In addition to representing individuals and families as heirs and beneficiaries, Jesse represents corporate and individual fiduciaries, including financial institutions and healthcare providers. Further, Jesse regularly advises clients involved in various Power of Attorney (POA) disputes, breach of fiduciary duty cases, contested heirships, wrongful death dependency hearings, and will and trust construction or interpretation matters. For o...
Julie Sirlin Pleshivoy advises high‑net‑worth families, family offices, and entrepreneurs on the full spectrum of wealth transfer and tax planning. Combining sophisticated tax knowledge with a background in investment management, she develops estate plans that safeguard family assets and support smooth transitions across generations. Leveraging her experience and an LL.M. in Federal Income Taxation, Julie brings a distinctive financial perspective to structuring business ventures, succession ...
David A. Baker serves as head of the Firm's Estate, Trust and Guardianship Controversy Practice Group. He advises clients in the areas of estate, trust and guardianship litigation; probate, estate, trust and guardianship administration; and charitable foundation and exempt organization administration and litigation. He also practices estate planning. Please visit our website for more on David's biography: https://www.mwe.com/en/team/b/baker-david-a
Domingo Such is a partner in the firm's Personal Planning practice. He focuses his practice on financial, estate and tax planning matters as they relate to ownership in various forms. This area of focus provides him with particularly broad legal perspectives in counseling family-owned and/or privately held businesses, as well as the family members and owners involved in these businesses. He represents wealthy families and individuals concerning significant and complex estates and trusts, advi...
James H. Cundiff advises clients on family wealth and business planning, federal estate, gift and generation-skipping tax planning, and estate and trust administration. James represents entrepreneurs, corporate executives, and other business leaders and wealthy individuals on estate and tax planning matters. Counseling closely held businesses and family members, James is actively engaged in the structuring of family businesses as well as business control and succession planning, multi-generat...
David Allen helps high-net-worth individuals and families with all their legal needs. With an approach that seamlessly integrates estate planning, tax minimization and concierge lawyering, David's advice allows his clients to spend less time managing advisors and more time focusing on their passions, their businesses and their families. From restructuring valuable art collections to coordinating legal services for multibillion-dollar family businesses and family offices, David is often the fi...
Nicole K. Mann focuses her practice on all aspects of tax and estate planning, estate and trust administration and family business planning. She also has considerable experience in estate, trust and tax litigation involving disputes between and among family members, fiduciaries and beneficiaries. Nicole is a co-chair of the Firm’s Trust & Estate Controversy group. Read full biography: https://www.mwe.com/people/mann-nicole-k/
Partner Nancy M. Spain, a founder of the firm, Spain, Spain & Varnet P.C., which joined Hahn Loeser & Parks LLP in 2022, focuses her career in general and probate-related law. She began her legal career in Cleveland, prior to relocating to Chicago in 1981 where she first worked in the trust department of the former Lake Shore Bank, prior to practicing law at Spain, Spain & Varnet P.C. Throughout her career, Nancy has been actively involved in drafting legislation and working with ...
Described by clients as a "phenomenal practitioner and extremely bright," Michael Hartz advises on business succession planning, tax-efficient wealth transfer into trusts for future generations and strategies for fulfilling philanthropic goals. Michael is ranked among the leading lawyers for private wealth law in Chambers High Net Worth, where his practical, effective solutions to complex problems have led to consistent recognition. With 40 years of experience in trust and estate planning and...
Jeanette Suarez Hunter advises high-net-worth individuals, families, business owners and family offices on a wide range of tax, wealth-transfer, succession planning and charitable-giving matters. Jeanette takes a holistic approach to helping her clients implement and manage comprehensive estate plans and business succession plans that meet their immediate and long-term goals. Read full biography: https://www.mwe.com/people/hunter-jeanette-suarez/
Larry is chair of the firm’s Private Wealth Services practice group. He facilitates successful legal strategies for entrepreneurs, tax-exempt organizations, fiduciaries and high-net worth families and individuals. This work involves estate, gift and charitable planning issues, including business succession, tax-efficient ownership structures, sophisticated tax-exempt structures, trust and estate administration, executive benefits, life insurance and international estate planning for wea...
Adam Damerow is a top attorney recognized by Best Lawyers in the practice area(s) of Trusts and Estates. Adam, who practices law in Chicago, Illinois, has been recognized since 2025. This recognition is based on an exhaustive peer-review survey, reflecting the high esteem in which Adam is held by other top lawyers in the same geographic and legal practice area.
Our Methodology
Recognition by Best Lawyers is based entirely on peer review. Our methodology is designed to capture, as accurately as possible, the consensus opinion of leading lawyers about the professional abilities of their colleagues within the same geographical area and legal practice area.
The Process
Best Lawyers employs a sophisticated, conscientious, rational, and transparent survey process designed to elicit meaningful and substantive evaluations of the quality of legal services. Our belief has always been that the quality of a peer review survey is directly related to the quality of the voters.