If you are a family member of a loved one who passed away in Southwest Florida and you are concerned about the disposition of your loved one’s estate, you may want to contact Russ Snyder.  A challenge to a will must be made within a three month statutory period if you have been served with a notice of administration.  Although the burden of proof in a will or trust contest is on the contestant, recent changes to Florida law have made those challenges more likely to be successful when active procurement of the will or trust has been shown by a substantial beneficiary. 

As a Board Certified Civil Trial Lawyer, Russ Snyder has 20 years of experience working in the field of probate and trust litigation.  The firm generally is handling over 20 inheritance disputes at a time and most of those estates involve at least $500,000.00 in assets.

Legal Assistant, Valerie Aitken, has 23 years of experience working with clients on complex probate and trust litigation problems.  She takes a personal interest in clients involved in these upsetting legal disputes.

Divorce
Spouses with long-term marriages and substantial marital assets have a lot at stake.  The old way of resolving these marital disputes through hearings, depositions, and trials may have worked best for the lawyers rather than the clients.  Litigating a divorce case polarizes people who have lived their lives together.  Instead of litigating, Russ Snyder advocates each getting a lawyer who will work up the financial aspects of the case and then work with a family law mediator to assist the parties and lawyers in resolving these marital issues without the need for any hearings or depositions.  This is a lower stress method of resolving marital issues and can save tens of thousands of dollars.  Cases that would take one or two years can be resolved, if everyone cooperates, in six months or less.

Mediation is not the answer for every couple.  However, most people who are about to divorce do not realize that they have a clear choice.  Now, divorcing couples can hire lawyers who will work up their cases and mediate a settlement.  This is the contemporary approach to divorce in the 21st Century.  It may not be right for all couples, but it should be right for most divorcing couples.  The clients have the full say so in their financial destinies.  The lawyers guide and assist.  Judges are happy to sign the paperwork that results from successful mediations.  The parties, with counsel, can certainly fashion a better solution than a judge who only has hours or a day or two to understand complex issues.  Everyone in the system ends up a winner.

Legal Assistant, Kim Lyle, has more than 10 years of experience as a legal assistant.  Kim assures that all records and documents are obtained promptly and that divorce cases worked up to allow early mediations.  The firm has a representation for fully complying with all family law discovery requirements and zealously requiring opposing counsel to do the same.

Personal Injury
As Southwest Florida has grown, so has its traffic and congestion problems, whether that would be on the highways or on the business premises of the tri-county area of Manatee, Sarasota and Charlotte Counties.  If you have been injured, or one of your loved ones has been injured seriously, you may want to consult with Mr. Snyder.  He has nearly 30 years of experience handling personal injury and wrongful death actions.  Property and casualty insurance companies take inconsistent approaches to resolving claims.  Some of these companies seem to have the philosophy that the harder they can make it for a claimant, the more chance there is that the claimant will walk away with no settlement or a small settlement.  Other companies are more fair-minded and believe that well-documented claims should be settled to save everyone the time, trouble and expense of litigation or trials.  Whether your claim is against an insured represented by the insurance company that wants you to get little or no compensation or by the insurance company that wants to pay reasonable compensation, it is extremely important to find a law firm with experience in handling serious injury cases.  Our law firm can help get you fully and fairly compensated.

The firm’s staff has established close relationships with the clients to assist the clients in getting through the legal process, both personally and professionally.