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Norv Brasch is a partner in the firm. He brings more than 40 years of experience to his trust and estate litigation practice, representing professional and family fiduciaries as well as beneficiaries of estates and trusts.
Norv prides himself on working collaboratively with all parties to find creative solutions outside the court system whenever possible. But when disputes cannot be resolved, he applies his significant litigation experience in advocating vigorously for his clients.
With an undergraduate degree in physics, Norv can address the numerical challenges of his cases as well as the interpersonal ones. Norv’s extensive experience working with families, combined with his technical and tax skills, gives him a decisive advantage in working though the issues of clients who are settling their family arrangements. He is a skilled negotiator who is proud of his track record in settling cases to the advantage of his clients.
Before the 2023 combination with Wade Ash, Norv was the managing partner at Trust & Estate Advocates in Downtown Denver. He started his career in 1983 at Holme Roberts & Owen, now Bryan Cave. During his tenure at the firm, he served as president of Jurisystems Corporation, a legal technology firm spun off from Holme Roberts in 1992. In 2001, Norv accepted a two-year term as Executive Director of the Thomas J. Watson (IBM Family) Foundation in Providence, Rhode Island, which funds graduating college seniors to spend a year abroad in independent study.
Norv grew up in Denver and was educated in Colorado. He lives in the city with his wife Kate, a veteran of the inimitable Tattered Cover Bookstore. They have four adult sons, three of whom live in Denver.
- Trust & Estate Litigation
- Business Succession Planning
- Estate Administration
- Trust Administration
- University of Denver, College of Law, J.D., 1983
- Colorado College, B.A., 1978
Phi Beta Kappa
- Colorado Supreme Court
- United States District Court for the District of Colorado
- Colorado Bar Association
Trust & Estate Section
Probate & Litigation Subcommittee, Immediate Past Co-Chair - University of Colorado President’s Gift Planning Advisory Council, Member
- Thomas J. Watson Foundation, Fellow, 1978-1979
Independent study based in Paris, resulting in the publication of an illustrated guidebook, Birthplaces of European Science, subsequently translated into French & German
- Norv is lead U.S. counsel for Hakfar Hayarok, a celebrated boarding school near Tel Aviv whose director was a fiduciary in a contested Colorado estate.
- Norv was co-counsel for Alcor Life Extension Foundation, for which he obtained emergency orders for the cryopreservation of a retired nurse who had signed up for the service. The case attracted worldwide publicity and is the subject of his regular seminar on end-of-life law and policy, The Right to Remain Frozen, which Norv leads with a panel of physicians and ethicists.
- Norv won a major case in the Colorado Court of Appeals with national estate and gift tax implications, establishing limitations on the use of “swap powers” in grantor trusts. Identified by the trial judge as a case of first impression both within Colorado and nationally, the ruling barred a disaffected grantor from removing the assets of a $10M trust for his promissory note, preserving the funds for his minor son under the trusteeship of his ex-wife.
- Panelist, Trust & Estate Fall Update: Alternative Dispute Resolution, moderated by Judge C. Jean Stewart, Ret., Colorado Bar Association, November 2022
- Panel Moderator, The Right to Remain Frozen: End of Life Law & Practice, multiple sponsors and presentations, ongoing since 2011
- Trust Registration Update, Colorado Law Review, May 2013