With twenty years’ experience as a litigator at respected law firms, and as Special Counsel to the New York City’s Corporation Counsel, Jill Teitel brings an integrated and comprehensive perspective tailored designed to clients’ needs. As Of Counsel for the Law Office of John Lang, she assists in all aspects of trusts and estate litigation and strategy. With an eye towards clients’ best interests, she gains great satisfaction in listening to her clients’ goals and talking through available strategies to achieve long lasting and meaningful results.

Early in her career as an attorney for the City of New York, handling over 100 trials engendered in Ms. Teitel a feeling that justice can and should be attained through preparation and hard work. She learned the way to strategize litigations to accentuate the positives. With the law office of John Lang, she advocates for fiduciaries and beneficiaries of trusts and estates and helps them achieve resolution and peace of mind.

Early Experience

Beginning in 2001, Ms. Teitel began to focus in the area of commercial litigation representing small businesses with cross border ties. From this practice, and the mentoring of trusts and estates litigators, she began to concentrate in the varied practice of trusts and estates and handled all aspects of this practice, including, litigation, estate planning, and estate administration. During her tenure at a small boutique firm in New York City, she worked on litigations regarding various high net worth estates in the New York County Surrogate’s Court and the U.S. Virgin Islands. In addition to her trusts and estates focus at that firm, she was lead counsel for a Panamanian company in an international arbitration before a tribunal at the American Arbitration Association. In that case, she asserted the company’s rights under a telecom contract against the company’s investors; In that case, prepared witnesses for trial in Venezuela; and relied upon the substantive foreign law of Venezuela to make her arguments to the tribunal.

Work for Kings County Surrogate’s Court

After 10 years of working as an associate at law firms in New York City, Ms. Teitel was appointed as Court Attorney Referee, in 2010. he Kings County Surrogate’s Court, she was called upon by Surrogate Margarita Lopez Torres to conference cases and assist in the resolution of over 50 disputed matters. Ms. Teitel drafted opinions for the Surrogate, and she heard and reported to the Surrogate on kinship hearings and Article 17A guardianship matters. It was here that she gained invaluable exposure to the inner workings of the Surrogate’s Court and the process of how best to negotiate effective results for her clients.

In 2011, Ms. Teitel transitioned to private practice and successfully represents parties before the Surrogate’s Courts of New York City and sometimes outside the City. The proceedings she commences and defends for her clients range from turnovers, ejectments, removal of fiduciaries and accountings. Ms. Teitel continues to work with international clients and always welcomes matters that have an international component. Ms. Teitel also advises clients in their estate planning.

Court Appointments

Ms. Teitel regularly receives appointments as Court Evaluator in New York Supreme Court before the Judges who handle guardianship matters. She is regularly appointed as Guardian ad Litem in New York County Surrogate’s Court. In the past, Ms. Teitel was a Court Examiner in Guardianship cases appointed by the Appellate Division, 2nd Department, where she reviewed Guardians’ annual accountings and reported to the Kings County Supreme Court, lending to her well rounded approach to advising clients in varied situations.

As Mediator

Ms. Teitel is a trained mediator and accepts cases from the New York State Supreme Court, New York County Commercial Division, and the New Jersey Superior Court. As passionate about the process of resolution as she is about advocating for her clients, mediation was a natural addition to Ms. Teitel’s services. She accepts a few cases a year and is interested in the theory and scholarship of mediation of commercial disputes.

In Public Service

Ms. Teitel is a strong advocate of educating and exchanging ideas in her local community and abroad. She served for several years as an observer to the United Nations Commission on International Trade Law in its working groups on Secured Transactions and Arbitration. As an ardent supporter of free speech, she served on the Board of Directors of the New York City non-profit, Women’s eNews for 2 years where she assisted eNews in creating their annual agendas and their annual gala event awarding honorees for their commitment to journalism and legal advocacy for women and women’s issues around the world.

She is devoted to teaching, public speaking and publishing her written work.

Publications

• Contributing co-author of white paper on ADR in the Trusts and Estates field (New York State Bar Association Journal, 2011)
• “The Use of Arbitral Secretaries in International Arbitration” published in The American Review of International Arbitration (Fall, 2008)
• Enforcement of Judgments and Arbitral Awards in the United States (Center for International Legal Studies, 2004)
• Co-Author of International Secured Transactions Chapter on the United States (Center for International Legal Studies, 2003)

Public Speaking

• Marine Park, Brooklyn – Carmine Carro Senior Center (Estate Planning Information Session, October, 2016)
• Park Slope, Brooklyn – YMCA (Estate Planning Information Session, April, 2016)
• Brooklyn Parents of Twins Club (Estate Planning for Families, January, 2012)
• Long Island University Paralegal – Instructor of Trusts and Estates (Spring 2011)
• College of Commercial Arbitrators (New York, New York, Fall, 2008)
• Instructor – International Arbitration (SICA-FICA, San Salvador, El Salvador – March, 2007)
• E-discovery: Collection of Data from the European Union (New York State Bar Association, New York, New York – March, 2006)
• International Commercial Arbitration (Center for International Legal Studies, Steamboat Springs, Colorado – February, 2005)
• Drafting International Contracts in the United States (CILS, Buenos Aires, Argentina – June, 2004)

Bar Admissions

• New York State (1996)
• New Jersey State (1996)
• Colorado State (2005)
• on inactive status
• United States District Courts for the Southern, Eastern, Northern and Western Districts of New York, New Jersey District Court
• United States Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit

Languages

Spanish (proficient), Japanese (conversant) and Russian (basic understanding)

Education

• Brooklyn Law School, Brooklyn, New York – J.D. February 1996
• CALI Award for Excellence: Alternative Dispute Resolution, February 1996
• Binghamton University, Binghamton, New York – Double Major – B.A. Interdisciplinary Political Systems of East Asia and B.A. in Political Science, May 1992