Victoria Z. Sulerzyski has over twenty years of experience in estates and trust law, special needs planning, guardianship, and advocacy for children with special needs. She takes a personal approach to her clients because she believes it is important to understand their needs so she can develop a holistic and comprehensive plan to meet the clients’ goals.

 

Victoria develops estate plans that are unique to each client. She has experience in preparing simple to complex plans that may include the preparation of wills, trusts, advance directives, durable general power-of-attorneys and charitable trusts. Victoria also teams with Jensen & McComas’s corporate transactional practice to counsel clients on business succession planning. She works with clients to provide guidance in preserving and transferring wealth in accordance with their unique wishes and circumstances.

 

Victoria also counsels clients who have a loved one with a disability.  Having a medically fragile and multi-disabled daughter of her own, she brings unique experience and passion in advising families with individuals with special needs.  Victoria embraces a holistic approach to advising families on community resources, government benefits such as Supplemental Security Income (“SSI”), Medicaid, Social Security Disability Insurance (“SSDI”), and other resources, such as Maryland Developmental Disabilities Administration (“DDA”) programs like the Community Pathways Waiver. She prepares and counsels clients on transition into post-secondary education and assists with preparation of special-needs trusts, including d(4)(a) trusts and third-party special needs trusts, and pooled-income trusts.

 

Victoria also works with families on guardianship matters including alternatives to guardianship, preparation of petitions for guardianship of the person and property, and representation in circuit courts throughout Maryland. Victoria is recognized in the community for her knowledge of the legal challenges facing the disabled and has testified many times on disability issues before the U.S. Congress and the Maryland General Assembly.

 

Losing a loved one is always a difficult time for a family. Victoria brings compassionate counsel to provide guidance on the probate process before the Orphans’ Courts throughout Maryland. From the initial petition for probate to final distribution of the assets of the estate, Victoria can provide you with sound guidance on marshaling the decedent’s assets, valuation of the probate and non-probate assets, creditor issues, inventories, administration accounts, and other unpredicted issues that may arise during the administration of the decedent’s estate.   

 

Victoria has worked as in-house counsel at an international educational technology corporation, where she oversaw data privacy matters. She is a Certified International Privacy Professional with a gold-standard CIPP-US designation from the International Association of Privacy Professionals. She is thus prepared to advise business clients on state, federal, and international data privacy regulations, breach responses, regulatory investigations, and internal policies. 

 

Victoria has also served as Chief of Staff to the Honorable Mary Ellen Barbera, (Retired Chief Judge) of the Supreme Court of Maryland (formerly the Court of Appeals of Maryland), and as a law clerk to the Honorable Alan M. Wilner (Retired), also of the Supreme Court of Maryland (formerly the Court of Appeals of Maryland). She has served on the boards of several nonprofit organizations, including the Kennedy Krieger Institute, and in 2012 was honored with the Volunteer of a Lifetime Award by the United Way of Central Maryland.

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