-28-
interests, respondent raises an additional issue whether the
transfers decedent made in trust were gifts of present interests.
The trustees of the eight Weinstock Trusts are Jack and
Lewis. The beneficiaries of the Weinstock Trusts, and their ages
at the time of the 1985 transfers in trust, were Lewis's
children: Richard, Lewis, Jr., and Lynn, age 22, 21, and 15,
respectively; Betty's children: Jeffrey, Alan, and Richard, age
23, 21, and 18, respectively; and Jack's children: Beth and
Carolyn, age 9 and 6, respectively.
The eight Weinstock Trusts were identical except for the
name of the beneficiary and in Paragraph II(a) each trust
provided the beneficiaries the legal right to make a demand upon
the trustees for payment up to the value of any gifts transferred
to the trust during the year of the transfer. Respondent,
however, contends that the gifts were not gifts of present
interests for two additional reasons: (1) The beneficiaries were
not provided written notice of the gifts and their right to
withdraw as required by the trust (the notice issue); and (2)
decedent and the donees had an agreement that the beneficiaries
would not withdraw the gifts from the trusts (the agreement
issue). We disagree with respondent's contentions and address
them in order.
The seminal cases on the issue of whether a transfer in
trust is a gift of a present interest are Crummey v.
Commissioner, 397 F.2d 82 (9th Cir. 1968), affg. in part and
Page: Previous 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 26 27 28 29 30 31 32 33 34 35 36 37 NextLast modified: May 25, 2011