Stevenson, Ferdinan v. Severs, Charles A.

In 1986, appellant Ferdinan B. Stevenson retained a lawyer, appellee Charles Severs, and an insurance agent, appellee Sam Radin of National Madison Group, Inc., to- set up a life insurance trust to benefit her four children upon her death. In order to avoid estate and gift tax liability for her yearly contributions to the trust, Severs advised Stevenson that the trust itself, instead of Stevenson’s estate, should be the owner and beneficiary of two life insurance policies, each worth half a million dollars. Nine years later, a different lawyer retained by Stevenson noticed that the life…