North Carolina Estate Planning & Fiduciary Law

Focus and practice areas

Based in Charlotte, the firm works with individuals, families, business owners, beneficiaries and fiduciaries. North Carolina Estate Planning & Fiduciary Law limits its practice to estate planning and fiduciary law, with related counsel for closely held and family-owned businesses. Its stated client base also includes corporate fiduciaries, executors and trustees.

The firm prepares wills, trusts and healthcare directives. These documents can address the transfer of property, the management of assets and decisions about medical care. The work also includes planning for disabled beneficiaries, an area that can require close attention to trust terms and public benefit rules.

In my opinion as a reviewer, the firm's defined focus helps explain how its services connect. Estate documents, fiduciary duties, tax questions and business succession can affect the same family or estate. The site presents these areas as related parts of its legal work.

Estate administration and court matters

The firm's work continues after a death through probate and trust administration. It advises the people and institutions responsible for carrying out wills, administering trusts and managing estate property. Executors, trustees and corporate fiduciaries appear among the client groups identified on the site.

Administration can involve legal duties owed to beneficiaries and decisions about distributions, records or estate property. The firm also represents beneficiaries of estates and trusts. That mix gives the team a stated role on different sides of the fiduciary relationship, depending on the matter and the client.

Court-related work includes fiduciary disputes and litigation. The site does not reduce this category to a single type of conflict. It places disputed estate and trust matters alongside probate, trust administration and other court proceedings.

Elder law and long-term care planning

Older clients and their families can seek counsel on Medicaid planning and long-term care concerns. The firm includes this work within its elder law services. Such planning may overlap with wills, trusts, asset ownership and arrangements for future decision-making.

Guardianship is another listed service. These cases can involve court authority over personal or financial decisions for someone who cannot manage those matters alone. The firm's related work for disabled beneficiaries may also involve planning designed around a beneficiary's circumstances and continued access to public benefits.

Healthcare directives add a practical planning tool to this part of the firm's work. They allow a client to record choices and appoint decision-makers before a health crisis occurs. The site groups these directives with wills and trusts as part of the firm's planning services.

Business ownership, succession and disputes

Closely held and family-owned companies form a stated part of the firm's client base. The firm advises on business succession planning, corporate governance, asset protection and taxation. These subjects can connect an owner's business interests with personal estate plans and future transfers of control.

The business practice also covers mergers and acquisitions. Business litigation is listed as well, which gives the firm a role when commercial disagreements require formal legal action. The site identifies business and corporate governance advice as part of this work.

This business component is relevant to owners whose companies make up part of their family wealth. Ownership terms, succession choices and estate documents may all affect what happens after retirement, incapacity or death. The firm's stated services allow it to address those legal questions within the same focused setting.

How the team is built

The website names three attorneys: James E. Hickmon, Jeremy T. Canipe and Audrey Bonham. It also lists Whitney Wechter as a staff member. Hickmon holds the role of principal attorney.

James E. Hickmon's credentials

Hickmon has certification from the North Carolina State Bar Board of Legal Specialization in Estate Planning and Probate Law. He is also a Certified Financial Planner. That financial planning credential fits closely with the firm's stated work involving wealth transfers, taxation, trusts and business ownership.

Hickmon teaches as an adjunct professor of law at Wake Forest University. His courses concern wealth transfer and the fiduciary income taxation of trusts and estates. This teaching work closely tracks subjects that appear in the firm's client services.

His education includes a Juris Doctor from Wake Forest University School of Law in 2001, an MBA from East Carolina University in 1996 and a Bachelor of Science from the University of North Carolina Wilmington in 1992. He has held admission to the Virginia State Bar since 2001 and the North Carolina State Bar since 2004.

Jeremy T. Canipe and Audrey Bonham

Canipe is identified as an estate planning lawyer in Charlotte and the founder of The Canipe Law Firm, PLLC. Before founding that firm, he worked as a partner at a multi-state law firm and helped lead its Business and Contract Law team. His prior experience also includes work in a bank's legal department and at a business litigation law firm.

The combination of estate planning and prior business law work corresponds with the firm's listed services for business owners. Those services include succession planning, mergers and acquisitions, corporate governance and business litigation. The website also names Audrey Bonham as an attorney on the team.