At the Sacramento Estate Planning Council’s 2016 Technical Forum on Tuesday an elderly gentleman sitting next to me said “old accountants never die, they just lose their balance” and “old attorneys just lose their appeal(s).” Sometimes both happen when an unbalanced accounting results in a lost appeal. The California Court of Appeal issued a rare decision on January 6, 2016 concerning trust accountings, finding in Gray v. Jewish Federation of Palm Springs and Desert Area that Probate Code section 16373 allows a trustee to rob Peter to pay Paul (as long as Peter gets his money back eventually).
