Trustee Removal in New York

A trustee occupies one of the most significant positions of legal trust and confidence that exists — they are entrusted with managing assets for the benefit of others, often for years or decades, and are legally required to place the beneficiaries' interests above their own at every turn. When a trustee violates these duties — whether through negligence, self-dealing, or deliberate misconduct — the consequences for beneficiaries can be severe and lasting. New York's courts have broad authority to remove a trustee who has breached their fiduciary obligations and to hold that trustee personally liable for losses caused by the breach.

Russel Morgan, Esq. and the Morgan Legal Group team represent trust beneficiaries throughout New York City and surrounding counties in proceedings to remove trustees and obtain redress for fiduciary misconduct. Our work in this area spans the full spectrum of trustee misconduct: from trustees who have made poor investment decisions and failed to account to beneficiaries, to trustees who have engaged in flagrant self-dealing by purchasing trust assets at below-market prices, to trustees who have looted trust accounts for personal benefit. The procedural avenue — Surrogate's Court for testamentary trusts, Supreme Court for inter vivos trusts — depends on how the trust was created.

In urgent situations where a trustee's ongoing misconduct threatens to dissipate or destroy trust assets, Morgan Legal Group moves quickly to seek emergency relief — including orders freezing trust assets, compelling an accounting, and appointing a temporary receiver — while the underlying removal proceeding is pending. Time is often critical in trustee misconduct cases: the longer a wrongdoing trustee remains in control, the greater the potential for irreversible harm. Morgan Legal Group serves beneficiaries across Manhattan, Brooklyn, Queens, the Bronx, Staten Island, Nassau, Westchester, and Suffolk counties.