Amy F. Altman
Phone: (212) 871-6954
Fax: (212) 818-1264
Email: aaltman@gss-law.com
vCard:
Amy F. Altman is a partner at Greenfield Stein & Senior, LLP, where she represents fiduciaries, beneficiaries and families in contested matters before the Surrogate’s Court. Her practice includes probate contests, discovery and accounting proceedings, removal and construction proceedings, kinship proceedings, and other fiduciary litigation. Surrogate’s Courts in New York, Kings, Queens, Nassau, Suffolk & Richmond Counties have appointed her guardian ad litem for minors, unknown heirs and incapacitated individuals.
Ms. Altman has focused her career exclusively on trusts and estates. She joined Greenfield Stein & Senior, LLP in May 2023, bringing more than 15 years of experience. She was previously a partner and head of the Trusts and Estates Department in the Long Island office of Abrams Fensterman, LLP. There she supervised all of the office’s trusts and estates matters, including estate planning, probate and administration, kinship and estate litigation. That breadth of experience shapes how she evaluates and litigates disputes over wills and trusts. Clients rely on her for clear guidance through each stage of a Surrogate’s Court proceeding and for candid assessments of risk, strategy and the prospects for resolution.
Ms. Altman writes and speaks frequently on developments in trusts and estates law. She has lectured for the New York State Bar Association and the Nassau County Bar Association on Surrogate’s Court practice, including probate and administration and SCPA 1404 discovery. Her work has appeared in the New York Law Journal, Law.com, Trusts & Estates magazine, the NYSBA Trusts and Estates Law Section Journal, the NYSBA Trusts and Estates Law Section Newsletter and the Nassau Lawyer. Her topics have ranged from trying forgery claims in probate contests, the subject of her 2026 Focus on Forgery series in the NYSBA Trusts and Estates Law Section Journal, to fiduciaries holding assets made unsaleable by ivory and endangered species laws and public accountability in cy pres matters such as the Barnes Foundation and Cooper Union. The cy pres article was co-authored with former New York County Surrogate Kristin Booth Glen.
She serves as a vice co-chair of the Surrogate’s Court Estates & Trusts Committee of the Nassau County Bar Association, where she previously served a three-year term on the board of directors. She is also a member of the Trusts and Estates Law Section of the New York State Bar Association.
Ms. Altman received her B.A. from New York University and her J.D. from Brooklyn Law School. She is admitted to practice in New York and New Jersey and before the United States District Court for the Southern District of New York. She lives in Nassau County with her husband and their three daughters.
Selected Publications
Focus on Forgery – Part One, NYSBA Trusts and Estates Law Section Journal, Vol. 59, No. 2 (2026)
Kinship Proceedings: Proving the Family Tree – Part One (co-author), NYSBA Trusts and Estates Law Section Journal, Vol. 59, No. 2 (2026)
Preventing Morbid Litigation, Trusts & Estates magazine, February 2017
New Inheritance Rights for Children Conceived After Death, Nassau Lawyer, August 2015
Art Law Part 2: The Legal Entanglement of Modern Art from Degenerate Art to Cornelius Gurlitt, Law.com, September 30, 2014
The Balance of Equities: Murder, the Insanity Plea and the Right to Wrongful Death Proceeds, Law.com, July 21, 2014
Art Law Part 1: From Eagles to Ivory, the Art of Lost Value, Law.com, May 12, 2014; republished in the NYSBA Trusts and Estates Law Section Newsletter, Fall 2014
Inheritance Issues Abound for Children Conceived After Death, Law.com, March 10, 2014
Selected Presentations
“A Primer on Probate and Administration in Surrogate’s Court,” Lecturer, Nassau County Bar Association, February 5, 2023
“SCPA Article 19 and Ejectment Proceedings,” Panelist, Archdiocese of Brooklyn, Immaculate Conception Center, April 2020
“Probate & Administration of Estates,” Lecturer, New York State Bar Association, Melville, NY, October 2018
“Conducting 1404 Discovery,” Lecturer, New York State Bar Association, Uniondale, NY, September 2017