Need a lawyer for something like this?
Tell us what happened and we’ll connect you with a law firm that handles cases like yours, fast. Free, no obligation.
Tell us what happened →Our chat is not a message to the firm profiled here. Awesome Attorneys is independent and not a law firm; we pass your details on only with your permission.
Attorney Advertising. This profile is independent editorial content produced by Awesome Attorneys and is not a paid placement. Nothing in this article constitutes legal advice or creates an attorney-client relationship. See our Methodology and Publisher Disclosure below.
At a Glance
| Founded by | Howard I. Elman and Jay W. Freiberg, all attorneys originally trained as commercial litigators before the firm built two focused specialties (per the firm) |
| Focus | Trust and estate litigation exclusively — will contests, accounting proceedings, fiduciary removal and surcharge actions, and breach of fiduciary duty claims — alongside a separate attorney liability defense practice |
| Office | 950 Third Avenue, Suite 1600, New York, NY 10022 |
| Signature results | Firm states it obtained a complete, early recovery of a misappropriated portion of a multi-million-dollar Italian estate through a temporary bank account restraint and attachment motion in New York County Supreme Court (per the firm) |
| Distinctive edge | A litigation-only boutique with no transactional estate planning practice, built specifically around fiduciary and trust disputes rather than drafting wills and trusts |
| Fee model | Not published; prospective clients should confirm directly |
| Known for | Complex trust and estate litigation for ultra-high-net-worth individuals and clients that include some of the country’s largest law firms (per the firm) |
Most firms in this directory’s Estate Planning category draft wills and trusts. Elman Freiberg does not — it exists specifically for the moment those documents are contested, a trust is mismanaged, or a fiduciary needs to be removed. That singular litigation focus, without a competing transactional practice pulling attorney time in a different direction, is the firm’s clearest structural choice.
Origin and Background
Founding partners Howard I. Elman and Jay W. Freiberg built the firm around a specific thesis: that trust and estate disputes are fundamentally different from other litigation and reward attorneys who handle nothing else. The firm states all of its lawyers were originally trained as commercial litigators, giving the firm’s fiduciary litigation practice a broader courtroom foundation than a firm built purely around estate planning that occasionally litigates. Every attorney at the firm, per its own materials, is an experienced, energetic litigator rather than a junior associate learning fiduciary litigation on the job.
What Makes This Firm Structurally Different
Elman Freiberg maintains two distinct, Chambers-rated practice areas under one roof — trust and estate disputes, and attorney liability defense — rather than the broader mix of estate planning, administration, and litigation that most trusts and estates firms offer. The firm is “most at home,” in its own words, in New York’s Surrogate’s Courts, but regularly appears in courts nationwide and has argued and won complex appeals in the Second Circuit and New York’s state appellate courts, aided by lawyers who include former federal appellate clerks.
Practice Areas
- Will and trust contests
- Accounting proceedings
- Fiduciary removal and surcharge actions
- Breach of fiduciary duty and fraud claims
- Charity and foundation disputes
- Appellate litigation in trust and estate matters
Track Record
The firm describes obtaining a complete recovery of the misappropriated portion of a multi-million-dollar Italian estate: after the eldest of three adult children refused to distribute his siblings’ shares from a New York bank account despite agreeing to, the firm filed a complaint and attachment motion in New York County Supreme Court and obtained a temporary restraint on the account, achieving what the firm describes as “a complete and very early victory” for its clients. The firm’s clients range from ultra-high-net-worth individuals to some of the country’s largest and most prestigious law firms, per its own materials, the latter typically in the attorney liability defense practice rather than trust litigation. These are the firm’s own characterizations of matters and outcomes; Awesome Attorneys did not independently verify the Italian estate matter against court dockets. Past results in any matter do not guarantee or predict a similar outcome in any future matter.
Client Voice
Elman Freiberg’s marketing emphasizes institutional and peer credibility — Chambers rankings and law firm clients — over consumer-style testimonials, and the firm’s own site does not publish individually attributed client reviews. That is consistent with a litigation boutique whose client base skews toward sophisticated, often institutional parties rather than first-time individual estate planning clients; Awesome Attorneys notes the absence rather than substituting generic praise.
Beyond the Courtroom
The firm has continued to grow selectively rather than rapidly: its 2024 addition of commercial litigator Scott Silberfein as its tenth attorney was announced as a notable hire by name, reflecting a boutique that adds lawyers deliberately rather than scaling as a volume practice. Both of the firm’s practice areas — trust and estate disputes and attorney liability defense — are independently Chambers-rated, an unusual double recognition for a firm this size.
Recognition
Chambers and Partners has named Elman Freiberg to its USA Regional Spotlight guide for New York Trusts & Estates in multiple consecutive years, describing it as “a boutique firm which handles an impressive range of trusts and estate litigation.” New York does not maintain a formal board-certification system for trusts and estates law comparable to Texas’s TBLS, so Awesome Attorneys does not apply “specialist” language to any attorney at this firm on that basis; the credentials above are peer-review recognitions, not government-conferred certifications.
New York Legal Backdrop
Trust and estate disputes in New York are litigated primarily in Surrogate’s Court under the Surrogate’s Court Procedure Act (SCPA), covering proceedings such as will contests (SCPA Article 14), compelled and contested accountings (SCPA Article 22), and fiduciary removal (SCPA § 711). Claims for breach of fiduciary duty by an executor or trustee generally must be brought within the statute of limitations applicable to the underlying claim, which can vary depending on whether the claim sounds in fraud, conversion, or a straightforward accounting objection. None of this is legal advice; a specific trust or estate dispute should be evaluated by a licensed New York attorney based on the actual facts and filing deadlines involved.
Awesome Attorneys Assessment
Elman Freiberg’s clearest differentiator is a genuinely litigation-only practice in trust and estate disputes, staffed entirely by experienced commercial litigators rather than estate planners who occasionally go to court, with a second Chambers-rated specialty in attorney liability defense. The honest trade-off is structural: this firm does not draft wills or trusts and cannot serve a client who needs an estate plan created rather than fought over, so it is a resource for the dispute stage, not the planning stage. For a beneficiary, fiduciary, or family member already in or heading toward a contested Surrogate’s Court matter, Elman Freiberg’s exclusive litigation focus and appellate track record make it a reasonable firm to have on a shortlist.
Methodology and Sourcing
This profile was researched from Elman Freiberg’s own website (ef-law.com), including its practice area and contact pages, cross-referenced against Chambers and Partners’ Spotlight profiles of the firm for both its trust and estate litigation and attorney liability defense practices, and the firm’s Super Lawyers and LinkedIn listings.
Publisher Disclosure and Independence Notice
Awesome Attorneys is an independent legal directory and editorial publication. This profile was not paid for, commissioned, or reviewed by Elman Freiberg PLLC prior to publication. Awesome Attorneys does not endorse, recommend, or warrant any profiled firm, and inclusion in this directory is not a paid placement. “Awesome Attorneys” is a brand name only and does not constitute a rating or ranking claim. Facts stated are current only as of this profile’s research date.