“Trust, but verify.” That’s what Ronald Reagan used to say about negotiating with the Soviet Union, but this maxim also applies whenever one person is entrusted with the care of another person’s money. This New York Law Journal is but the latest example of that point. A retired partner of one of the largest and most prestigious law firms in the country, Paul, Weiss, Rifkind, Wharton & Garrison, has been disbarred for stealing more than $500,000 from a family trust for which he was a trustee. Allan L. Blumstein admitted he essentially depleted an account intended to benefit his elderly aunt, who was suffering from dementia and was confined to a nursing home. The former litigator said he took the money to maintain a lavish but unaffordable lifestyle, without which he feared his wife would leave him.
