Peter D. Hershman, Esq.

For over thirty years, Peter has concentrated his practice on closely held businesses and high net worth individuals.  On behalf of businesses,  he is regularly involved in various corporate transactions and taxation, mergers and acquisitions, succession planning, planning for capital infusions, developing retirement programs, business entity selection and restructuring, and business divorces.  He has represented many types of businesses including manufacturing, hospitals, wholesale distributors, construction, retail, real estate and many professional practices, such as medical, dental, accounting and legal.  With high net worth individuals, he engages in estate planning, probate administration and inter-generational asset reallocation.

The nature of his practice requires the application of significant creativity.  It also requires working closely with the client to understand their objective and to develope workable alternatives that offer solutions to the problems at hand.  These are necessary attributes to a successful attorney-client relationship.  Through his experience and knowledge, Peter is able to bring matters to a successful conclusion while keeping the family business and the family in tact.

In addition to his practice of law, Peter is presently serving as the Probate Judge for the District of Woodbridge.  He has always found the time to be involved in community affairs.  He is a past President of Marrakech, Inc.; past member of the Cheshire Board of Education; past member and Chairman of the Woodbridge Board of Fire Commissioners; past Legal Volunteer for Hartford Hospice; past Troop Committee Chairman, Boy Scout Troop 907, Woodbridge, Connecticut.  He was appointed by then Governor Ella Grasso to serve as the public representative to the Commission to Recodify the Banking Laws of the State of Connecticut.

Peter briefed and successfully argued before the State of Connecticut Supreme Court the Connecticut case of Zeoli v. State of Connecticut Department of Income Maintenance, which has become a landmark case in Connecticut regarding special needs trusts and which case is also the subject of an ALR article.

While attending the University of Connecticut School of Law, he was Lead Articles Editor of the University of Connecticut Law Review and a winner of the American Jurisprudence Book Award in International Business Transactions.  At the University of Pittsburgh, he was nominated for a Woodrow Wilson Fellowship in Economics.

Peter is admitted to the bars in Connecticut, 1972; U.S. District Court, District of Connecticut, 1973; U.S. Court of Appeals, Second Circuit, 1975; and U.S. Tax Court, 1982.