Hugin,
I was not talking about a charitable trust because I do not believe that’s what is being discussed here. It’s called the Sterling Family Trust, which strongly suggests that it’s a typical lifetime revocable trust set up to avoid probate and prying eyes, but unable to avoid taxes. He does have living children, so it’s probably set up with them as beneficiaries. Typically, charitable trusts are called charitable trusts in the title. So if my assumption that it’s not a charitable trust is correct my analysis of the tax implications is also correct.
The LA Crimes ran an article this week that he would clear $1.5 after capital gains.
As I said originally, it is taxable UNLESS it were a CRT, which I also suspect it’s not. So we seem to agree, a regular revocable trust does not protect his heirs from estate taxes as the author claimed.