Serving as the neutral fiduciary in trust matters provides extensive benefits to parties in all facets of cases from planning to litigated cases. The neutrality of professional fiduciaries comes with different responsibilities and requires guidance in effectively discharging those duties, while understanding how professional fiduciaries’ roles can be a benefit and a hindrance in particular cases. This presentation will examine the role and responsibilities of professional fiduciaries as Trustees from the perspective of a Judge, a litigator, and an estate planner. The panel will discuss how the fiduciary can successfully, neutrally navigate among litigious factions in trust matters, and how professional fiduciaries can best capitalize on their neutral roles and protect the intent of trust documents. The Panel will discuss the professional fiduciaries roles through examining recent cases, where the decisions focused on the Trustee’s duty of impartiality, provide examples of successful and unsuccessful applications of the principles addressed in these cases.
D1 – Planning, Litigating, & Judging the Professional Fiduciary’s Duty of Impartiality
Speakers
Mark A. Lester
Lester & Hirschberg, LLP
Mark A. Lester is a managing partner of Lester & Hirschberg, LLP, in Camarillo, California, where his practice focuses on trust, estate, and conservatorship litigation, estate planning, and trust and estate administration. Mr. Lester was trial and appellate counsel in Breslin v. Breslin (2021) 62 Cal.App.5th 801, Christie v. Kimball (2012) 202 Cal.App.4th 1407, and Estate of Odian (2006) 145 Cal.App.4th 152, and co- author of one of the Amicus Briefs relied upon and quoted by the California Supreme Court in reversing the Court of Appeal in Barefoot v. Jennings (2020) 8 Cal.5th 822. He is recognized by the State Bar of California Board of Legal Specialization as a certified specialist in estate planning, trust and probate law for over 20 years and, after a 5-year term on the Estate Planning Law Advisory Commission (including as chair of the commission 2015-2016), served as an appointed member to (and chair of) the California Board of Legal Specialization.
Mr. Lester has been qualified and testified as an expert witness on the standard of care and practice for trustees in maintaining impartiality between competing beneficial interests in the matter entitled In the Marilyn and Robert Carman Family Trust, Santa Barbara Superior Court Case No. 16PR00419 (2021). He has also been deposed as an expert witness (i) on the standard of care and practice for court-appointed attorney in preparation of estate planning documents for a conservatee in the matter entitled Kanner v. Schomer Law Group, APC, et al., Los Angeles County Superior Court Case No. BC683648 (2020) and (ii) on the issues of undue influence, shifting burdens of proof re undue influence, validity and efficacy of an amendment to trust, and application of care custodian statutes to family friend in the matter entitled In the Matter of: Margaret B. Chappell Living Trust dated December 16, 2010, as amended (Aviles v. Swearingen), Ventura County Superior Court Case No. 56-2016-00479394-PR-TR-OXN (2017). Since 2001, Mr. Lester is an AV (Preeminent) ™ peer-review-rated attorney by LexisNexis/Martindale Hubbell. In 2015 through 2025, Mr. Lester has been recognized as a Southern California Super Lawyer™ in Estate & Trust Litigation, in 2015 and 2018 in Estate Planning & Probate, in 2018 in Corporate and Business areas of the law, and in 2022 through 2025 as Top 100 Attorneys in Southern California. From time to time since 2017, Mr. Lester serves as a judge pro tem for the Probate Department of the Ventura County Superior Court.
Mr. Lester received his B.A. degree from Stanford University, his J.D. degree from Seattle University School of Law, and his LL.M. degree in taxation from Boston University.
Eric Hirschberg
Lester & Hirschberg, LLP
Eric A. Hirschberg is a partner at the law firm of Lester & Hirschberg, LLP and focuses his practice in the areas of estate planning, probate, trust administration, trust and estate litigation, business and corporate transactions, and entity formation.
Eric is recognized by the State Bar of California Board of Legal Specialization as a certified specialist in estate planning, trust and probate law. Eric collaborates with his estate planning clients to craft estate plans ensuring that his clients are prepared for their futures and their wishes are honored, while avoiding unnecessary taxes and administrative costs. In emotionally trying times after losing a loved one, Eric assists his clients by guiding them through the trust administration, probate process, or estate litigation.
Much of Eric’s practice focuses on litigation involving complex trust and estate disputes. Eric has earned a reputation in the legal community, and with his clients, for his ability to resolve difficult matters, participating in numerous successful mediations per year. He frequently prepares and presents presentations regarding estate planning and trust and estate litigation to professional and community groups, as well as teaches continuing legal education programs to other attorneys in this area of practice.
Eric graduated from the University of California, San Diego in 2006 with a Bachelor of Arts in Psychology. After graduation, he attended Pepperdine University School of Law, receiving his Juris Doctor in June 2009. While at Pepperdine he externed for two Los Angeles Superior Court Judges, the Ventura County District Attorney’s Office and worked for HBO’s Legal Department. He was admitted to the California Bar in November 2009 and subsequently admitted to the United States District Court for the Central District of California.
Hon. Judge Mary Thornton-House (Ret.)
Alternative Resolution Centers (ARC)
Judge Mary Thornton House retired from the Los Angeles Superior Court in September 2018 after serving for 22 years. She has started her third career as a private neutral for Alternative Resolution Centers (ARC). Starting out in the Pasadena Municipal Court handling criminal cases, Judge House quickly transitioned to civil and spent 8 years in probate assignments in Pasadena and the Stanley Mosk Courthouse.
Judge House is also the author of Thomson Reuter’s California Civil Jury Instruction Companion Handbook, updated yearly. Judge House has been honored throughout her career by many organizations. In 2004, Los Angeles County honored her as one of its ‘Women of the Year’ and named Judge of the Year by the Pasadena Bar Association. In 2008, the California Judges Association awarded her the Bernard F. Jefferson’s Award for Excellence in Judicial Education. In 2011, the San Fernando Valley Bar Association awarded her the Excellence in Judicial Administration award for her leadership in getting California’s Expedited Jury Trials legislation passed, the development of the current universal judgment form, and simplification of small claims pleadings. In 2013, the San Fernando Valley Bar Association named her their Judge of the Year.
Judge House was Dean of the California B.E. Witkin Judicial College which provides for education of all judicial officers in California. The college is a nationally recognized institution and exemplar for judicial education where she has been an instructor and seminar leader since 1997. In 2007, Yale Law School selected her to teach at their China Law Center in Beijing, China, courses on small claims and limited civil procedures to selected judges from throughout China.
Judge House was an Assistant City Attorney and civil litigator for the City of Los Angeles. She graduated from UCLA and received her Juris Doctorate from the University of San Diego.