Michael Karlin recently spoke to Forbes about the Russian oligarch, Dmitry Zelenov, who recently passed during a dinner party on the French Riviera. Infighting for control of Dmitry’s assets has already begun in his family. His wife and son claim others in the family are trying to lock them out of many of Dmitry’s assets that they previously had access to.
On the issue of Dmitry’s lack of a will, Michael said, “Where things really go wrong [in estate planning] is where there’s neither a will nor a trust of some sort.” Dmitry had a complicated web of trusts and LLCs surrounding his fortune that only he fully knew. Michael added that the different legal systems that Zelenov’s varying assets reside under could add another layer to this ordeal.
