Beneficiary Indemnifying Trustee

[Music] So there's times when a trustee will ask the beneficiary to sign a piece of paper indemnifying the trustee prior to making a distribution of trust assets so first let's talk about what is an indemnification an indemnification is a legal term of art and it literally means that one person is going to pay for any loss or harm suffered by another person so what the trustee is worried about is maybe there's an outstanding tax liability or maybe the trustees worried that some creditor will come forward in the future and want to be paid out of the trust funds but the trustees already made a distribution out of the trust funds the trustee wouldn't be able to pay that creditor and so the trustee wants the beneficiary to agree to pay that creditor of the trust now there's times when a beneficiary can sign an indemnification and is perfectly fine in fact there's many times especially when dealing with tax issues like the IRS when the IRS is going to come after the beneficiaries no matter whether you sign an indemnification or not and so that is perfectly fine where you get into problems is when a trustee wants a release so if a trustee says I want you to release me of all my duties and obligations so that you can't come back and sue me later for something mistake I may have made that I'd be a little bit more careful with now if you've gotten full disclosure of everything from the trustee maybe you do want to sign a release if you haven't gotten a full disclosure from the trustee under no circumstances should you want to sign a release you want to at least get information to see if the trustees done their job but that's a different issue from indemnification indemnification is literally just the beneficiaries agreeing to pay for some expense is something crops up in the future that's something you might be willing to sign you definitely should have it reviewed by a lawyer first before you sign anything that a trustee asks of you Albertson and Davidson is here to help you fight for your inheritance check out Alda law calm for our complete library of helpful legal videos and articles from your favorite California trusts and will litigation law firm Albertson and Davidson LLP.