James P. Spica
Southfield,
Michigan
James P. Spica is the principal author of the undisclosed trusts provisions added to the Michigan Trust Code by 2024 PA 1, the divided trusteeship provisions enacted by 2018 PA 662, the multistatute Michigan trust decanting regime (2012 PA 483–485), and Michigan's Personal Property Trust Perpetuities Act (2008 PA 148). Mr. Spica is a commissioner (appointed by the Michigan Legislative Council) to the Uniform Law Commission (ULC), serving on ULC drafting committees including those for the Uniform Conflict of Laws in Trusts and Estates Act and the Uniform Fiduciary Income and Principal Act (UFIPA). He was the American Bar Association (ABA) Advisor to the ULC's Uniform Directed Trust Drafting Committee and served on the ad hoc committee of the ABA's Real Property Trust and Estate Law Section that drafted the Section's response to the Treasury Department's request (in IRS Notice 2011-101) for comments on the tax implications of trust decanting. Mr. Spica is a fellow of the American Bar Foundation and of the American College of Trust and Estate Counsel (ACTEC). He is a member of the ACTEC State Laws and Legal Education Committees, an ACTEC CLE presenter, and was an invited presenter at the 2022 Tulane/ACTEC Academic Symposium on Conflict of Laws in Trusts and Estates held at the Tulane University School of Law in New Orleans. Mr. Spica is chairperson of the Probate and Estate Planning Section of the State Bar of Michigan, chair of the Section Council's UFIPA Committee, cochair of the Council’s Nonbanking Entity Trust Powers Committee, and a former member of the ICLE Probate and Estate Planning Advisory Board. He is listed in Chambers High Net Worth guide and by Michigan Super Lawyers. Mr. Spica has been recognized by "Best Lawyers in America" as Detroit Lawyer of the Year for Trusts and Estates in 2023 and for Litigation - Trusts and Estates in 2023 and 2019, in Leading Lawyers' Top 10 Trust, Will & Estate Planning - Michigan Edition 2020, and as a Top Lawyer by "DBusiness." He clerked for Hon. Richard C. Wilbur on the U.S. Tax Court in 1985 and from 1989 to 2000, taught jurisprudence, taxation, and trusts and estates as an assistant/associate professor of law at the University of Detroit Mercy, where he was tenured in 1996.
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