ESTATE PLANNING COUNCIL OF HAMPDEN COUNTY

Expect to get a private/public perspective on trusts, and Judge Sacks will periodically provide a view from the bench.

ABOUT THE SPEAKERS

Bernard G. Cuadra is an Assistant Attorney General in the Non-Profit Organizations/Public Charities Division of the Massachusetts Office of the Attorney General.  Bernardo is also Chair of the AGO’s Well-Being Committee and an adjunct professor at New England Law | Boston.  Before joining the AGO in 2016, Bernardo was an associate in the Trusts & Estates practice group at Shipman & Goodwin in Hartford, CT, and clerked for the Connecticut Supreme Court.  Bernardo is a native and current Western Massachusettsian, growing up in Wilbraham, attending Western New England College School of Law, and currently living in Ludlow.   

Judge David G. Sacks was sworn in as a Hampden Probate and Family Court judge by then Governor Michael S. Dukakis in 1986 and served until his mandatory retirement in 2020, including having been First Justice from 1992 to 2003. 

In retirement, Judge Sacks is a 2021-2022 Massachusetts Access to Justice Fellow, volunteering with Senior Partners for Justice including serving as a Conciliator. 

He is on the Hampden County Bar Association’s Arbitration and Mediation Panel; the Board of Directors of the Massachusetts Chapter of the A.F.C.C.; a youth mentor for the refugee resettlement program of Jewish Family Services in Springfield; vice chair of the Trial Court’s Standing Committee on Dispute Resolution; and in 2020 was elected as a Biden Delegate to the Democratic National Convention from the Massachusetts First Congressional District. He is co-chair of the Mass. Continuing Legal Education’s Family Law Trial Advocacy Workshop.

Most recently, Judge Sacks received the Gideon’s Trumpet 2021 award from the Volunteer Lawyers Project of the Boston Bar Association.  

Ryan P. McManus is a partner in Hemenway & Barnes LLP, where he concentrates his practice in the areas of fiduciary and business litigation. He represents clients in state and federal courts, and in alternative dispute resolution.

Ryan regularly litigates disputes between trustees and beneficiaries, will contests, and other contested estate matters. He has considerable experience navigating disputes over mental capacity and allegations of undue influence.

Ryan also has substantial appellate experience representing clients before the U.S. Supreme Court, the U.S. Courts of Appeals for the Third, Fifth, Ninth and Eleventh Circuits, the Massachusetts Supreme Judicial Court, and the appellate courts of numerous states.

Ryan has been named to the Massachusetts Super Lawyers List.

There is no cost for this meeting.

A Zoom invitation will be sent closer to the meeting date.