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919 Third Avenue
New York, NY 10022
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T:
+1 212 909 7217
F:
+1 212 521 7212
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Areas of Practice
Experience
Jonathan Rikoon is a partner in the Trusts and Estates Group and chairs the Group. He has helped to build the firm’s trusts and estates practice with his innovative thinking and dedication to client service. Mr. Rikoon has substantial experience in all aspects of trusts and estates work, including planning, administration and litigation, which allows him to easily assist clients in navigating the obstacles that can arise in the estate-planning process.
Mr. Rikoon engages in sophisticated estate and tax planning for wealthy individuals and families, preparation of wills and trusts and the administration of trusts and estates. He helps to establish various tax-efficient multi-tier family, business and investment vehicles, such as partnerships, limited liability companies and closely held corporations with trust ownership, and he structures third-party business transactions to facilitate tax and estate planning. Under Mr. Rikoon’s leadership, the firm has pioneered the development of estate planning techniques customized for private equity fund principals and hedge fund managers, and he has written and lectured on that topic for the NYU Institute on Federal Taxation, the University of Miami Heckerling Institute on Estate Planning and other groups.
His practice also includes negotiation and resolution of family business and trust disputes, as well as Surrogate’s Court and tax litigation. Chambers USA (2009) ranks Mr. Rikoon as a national leader in Wealth Management, noting that he “earns effusive praise” from clients (2009), who describe him as “startlingly bright” (2008). In Worth magazine's December 2005, 2007 and 2008 issues, Mr. Rikoon is rated as one of the top 100 attorneys in tax and estate planning for high-net worth individuals in the US. Mr. Rikoon is a Fellow of the American College of Trust and Estate Counsel and a member of its Business Planning Committee. He is a member of the Association of the Bar of the City of New York (Committee on Estate and Gift Taxation, 1993-1996; Committee on Trusts, Estates and Surrogate’s Courts, 1996-2000, and 2007-date) and the New York State Bar Association (Trusts and Estates Section, Executive Committee 2003-date, First District Representative 2007-date, Committee on Estate Litigation member 1992-date, Chair 2004-2006), and in those capacities has drafted several items of proposed and enacted New York legislation. Mr. Rikoon is also a member of the International Bar Association (Individual Tax and Estate Planning, Wills, Trusts, and Succession Committee, 2005-date).
In addition, Mr. Rikoon is the principal author of a text on drafting wills and trusts, “Stocker and Rikoon on Drawing Wills and Trusts” (Practising Law Institute, 12th Edition 2000 and annual supplements through 2009), and its predecessors since 1990, as well as “Essential Facts: Estate Planning and Family Wealth Transfers” (Warren, Gorham and Lamont 1995). His writings have appeared in a number of journals, and he has lectured for the Practising Law Institute, the American Corporate Counsel Association, the American College of Trust and Estate Counsel, the New York State, City and County bar associations and other groups. Mr. Rikoon is a contributing author of The Private Equity Primer: The Best of the Debevoise & Plimpton Private Equity Report and the Debevoise & Plimpton Private Equity Report.
In 2008, Mr. Rikoon was nominated by the Senate and appointed by the President to serve as a member of the U.S. Commission for the Preservation of America's Heritage Abroad. He was appointed in 2009 to the New York EPTL-SCPA Legislative Advisory Committee as a liaison to the New York City Bar Association.
Mr. Rikoon joined Debevoise & Plimpton LLP as Counsel in 1995. He received his A.B. from the University of Pennsylvania in 1976 cum laude and with General Honors, and his J.D. cum laude from NYU School of Law in 1979 where he was a Pomeroy Scholar and a member of the Order of the Coif and the NYU Law Review. Prior to joining Debevoise, Mr. Rikoon was an associate and a principal attorney at the firm of Paul, Weiss, Rifkind, Wharton & Garrison, and Of Counsel at the firm of Mudge Rose Guthrie Alexander & Ferdon.
Language(s)
English
French
Bar Admissions
New York
Education
University of Pennsylvania,
1976,
A.B.
New York University School of Law,
1979,
J.D.
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