Probate Law News

Mark J. Avery Pleads Guilty To $52 Million Dollar Wire Fraud And Money Laundering Scheme

United States Attorney Nelson P. Cohen announced today, March 6, 2007, that Mark J. Avery (hereafter Avery), former owner of Security Aviation, Inc., plead guilty in federal court in Anchorage to five counts of wire fraud and ten counts of money laundering in defrauding the May Smith Trust of over $52 million dollars. The plea agreement requires Avery to serve a sentence of imprisonment that ranges from 14 to 17 and a half years and to pay restitution to the May Smith Trust in the amount of $52.125 million dollars. The prosecution was the result of a joint investigation conducted by the United States Attorney’s Office, Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) and Internal Revenue Service-Criminal Investigation (IRS-CI), and was based on evidence obtained from the simultaneous execution of search warrants for the businesses of Avery in February, 2006. As a result of those searches investigators of the FBI and IRS-CI came into possession of thousands of pages of documents detailing Avery’s breach of fiduciary duty as Trustee to the May Smith Trust and May Wong Smith.

In connection with the guilty plea, Assistant United States Attorney Steven E. Skrocki advised the court that the United States has established the following facts:

Avery was a trustee and lawyer for the May and Stanley Smith Charitable Trust and the May Smith Trust. Avery held those positions since early 2002 and received yearly compensation in the amount of $600,000 in trustee fees for his role as trustee and fiduciary to these Trusts. Avery was also owner/operator of Avery and Associates, L.L.C., Security Aviation, Inc., and Regional Protective Services, L.L.C., located at 3230 C Street, Anchorage, Alaska. Avery’s companies were engaged in, among other things, air charter services, aeromedical evacuation, legal services, development of real property, and court imposed electronic monitoring. Read more at anchorage.fbi.gov.

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	Did You Know?
	Probate Is Handled In Court Probate cases normally occur in state and county court where the deceased permanently lived at the time of his or her death. In different states such courts may go by different names. Some are simply called the Probate Court. In New Yorkthey are called the Surrogates Court and in California they are called the Superior Court, Probate Division. The probate court will normally handle all the personal property the deceased owned, plus all the real estate the deceased owned located in that same state.