Principal, Levy Law & Mediation Firm, P.C.
Suzanne Levy, Esq.
An attorney, a court-appointed neutral, and a mediator who spends most of her working life in the space where family relationships and the law overlap. Admitted in New York for more than 33 years.
How the practice approaches its work
Planning before crisis
Nearly every difficult elder law situation was easier to solve a year earlier. The practice is built around getting families to the decision before the emergency does.
Resolution over escalation
Litigation is sometimes necessary and sometimes just expensive. Because Suzanne mediates these disputes as well as litigating them, that judgment is made honestly at the outset.
Dignity as the objective
The point of this work is to help people obtain the care they need while preserving their dignity and their savings. Those are not competing goals.
Suzanne Levy is the principal of Levy Law & Mediation Firm, P.C., a concierge trusts and estates practice established in 1993 with offices in Great Neck and in the Woolworth Building in Manhattan. Her practice covers trusts and estates, elder law, mediation, related litigation and commercial law.
A significant part of her work is done as a neutral rather than as an advocate. She is appointed to the Part 146 Mediator Rosters for the Surrogate’s Court in New York, Westchester and Suffolk Counties, serves as a Mediator in the 3rd and 4th Surrogate’s Court Judicial Districts, and handles mediations for the Commercial Division in Nassau and Suffolk Counties. She serves as a Special Master handling Surrogate’s Court appeals for the Appellate Division, Second Department, and is an approved FINRA arbitrator.
She is also frequently appointed by New York State Court judges as Court Evaluator, as Guardian for incapacitated persons, and as Guardian Ad Litem. That experience shapes how she handles guardianship matters for families: she has written the Court Evaluator’s report that a judge relies on, and she knows what a court is actually looking for.
Her interest in mediation is practical rather than theoretical. Trusts and estates disputes are simultaneously legal and personal, and the major commercial dispute resolution panels have built their rosters in other areas, such as maritime, aviation, and asbestos, at fee levels that put them beyond most families. Mediation lets the parties be the architects of their own agreement, keeps the matter confidential, and has ended family conflicts that had run for decades.
Roles the firm serves in
- Court Evaluator
- Guardian for Incapacitated Persons
- Guardian Ad Litem
- Referee
- Receiver
- Mediator
- Arbitrator
Appointments and panels
- Part 146 Mediator Rosters, Surrogate’s Court (New York, Westchester and Suffolk Counties)
- Mediator, 3rd and 4th Surrogate’s Court Judicial Districts, New York
- Mediator, Commercial Division (Nassau and Suffolk Counties)
- Special Master, Surrogate’s Court appeals (Appellate Division, Second Department)
- Approved FINRA Arbitrator
Education
- Juris Doctor, Albany Law School
- B.S., Finance and Management, School of Management, State University of New York at Binghamton
Professional memberships
- Principal and Founding Member
- Mediator
- Special Master (NY App. 2nd Dept.)
- Past DRS Co-Chair, NYSBA Trusts & Estates Committee
- Past Co-Chair, Nassau County ADR Committee
- Past Co-Chair, Nassau County Elder Law Committee
- WealthCounsel
- Formerly a registered Life Insurance Agent with the New York State Department of Financial Services
Where the firm practices
The firm works with families across Nassau, New York, Queens, Kings, Westchester and Suffolk Counties from its two offices, and appears in the Surrogate’s Courts and Supreme Courts of those counties. Both office addresses and directions are here.
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