Stay cool, calm and collected. Litigation can be a long and stressful process that often becomes highly emotional. One of the biggest mistakes you can make, though, is to overreact to a lawsuit. While you should certainly be diligent with your response, you should not allow the lawsuit to consume all of your attention.

When you pass away, everything that you separately own becomes your estate.  Everyone should have a will to control what happens with those assets.  Without one, the state determines who receives your assets when you die, regardless of your wishes. You also have no control over who is appointed to be in charge of your estate or who is appointed as guardian of your minor children. A simple will can alleviate these issues, as well as make the process of handling your estate faster, cheaper and easier. Kevin Hickey Law Partners can help you assess your needs, prepare a will that expresses your wishes and make sure that it is properly executed.

In addition to a will, it is recommended that everyone have a healthcare power of attorney and living will. These documents allow you to nominate someone to make medical decisions for you in the event that you are unable to do so yourself and also to state your wishes in the event that you are terminally ill and permanently unconscious. We are happy to assist you with these important documents as well.

While these basic documents should be considered the minimum that you have prepared, in many situations, additional estate planning can be advantageous. At Kevin Hickey Law Partners, we have the experience to handle not only basic estate planning but also more complex planning involving trusts, beneficiary deeds, limited liability companies and other estate planning tools. 

Trusts, in particular, are a very powerful means of managing assets for beneficiaries, such as minor children, as well as for keeping estates from having to go through probate, which can save your beneficiaries thousands of dollars and countless hours of time. If your estate is large enough, a trust may even allow you to easily avoid a large estate tax bill.

Contact us to discuss your options and to determine the best fit for your loved ones and you.

False allegations of child abuse can and do utterly destroy the lives of both the falsely accused and the children they are wrongly accused of harming.

In my experience, most cases of false abuse allegations arise in one of two contexts:

1. In the midst of a custody battle, one parent may raise such allegations in order to gain a strategic advantage over the other parent.

2. Occasionally, over-zealous or improperly motivated CPS (Child Protective Services) personnel may initiate proceedings, even in the absence of actual evidence.

I have successfully represented clients in both contexts. My experience has included defense against the charges directly or in the context of a custody battle, as well as filing and prosecuting civil rights cases against CPS and other investigating or charging agencies based on section 1983 of Title 42 of the United States Code.

FREE REPORT ON DEFENDING AGAINST FALSE ABUSE ALLEGATIONS
If you’d like to receive a free report on how to defend against false charges of child abuse and receive our monthly newsletter on CPS and false abuse issues, enter your name and email in the form on the right side of this page and click “Submit.”

Our reports — one geared towards attorneys and one towards individuals facing false charges — will be emailed to you when they are ready. You can unsubscribe at any time, and we will never send you spam, or sell or give away your information to anyone else.

HELPFUL RESOURCES FOR ATTORNEYS AND INDIVIDUALS
I have added two resources to this site — one for attorneys, and one for individuals. For divorce lawyers, I have compiled a list of “do’s and don’ts” when false abuse charges are levied in custody & divorce litigation. For individuals, I’ve written a primer on basic Constitutional rights in the context of an abuse investigation and what those rights mean at a practical level.

I am available for consult on false/wrongful allegation cases. If you are an individual in Arkansas facing such charges, or if you are an attorney in the U.S. with a client against whom allegations have been made, please contact me through this form or at 479.434-2414.

Additionally, you may find this collection of resources about false abuse allegations helpful.