What is the best way to leave any assets or life insurance to my domestic partner who is a felon & owes restitution?

The way to provide for the daughter and your partner is to set up a trust for your assets. The life insurance policy should show the trust as the beneficiary. The trustee must have the power to provide support for the daughter and the partner at his/her discretion and to allow the daughter and partner the use of trust assets without giving the assets to them. For example, if your partner needs a car, the trust can buy a car and own the car while allowing your partner to drive it. If the trust buys a car and gives it to your partner, her creditors could seize the car, but if the trust retains ownership of the car and merely lets her use it, the creditors can't touch it.

Suggest you consult with an estate planning lawyer who will probably advise the preparation of a trust with supporting documents.

If you provide for her (in your Will) in trust rather than outright, her inheritance will be protected against her creditors.

You asked this question yesterday.

There is no completely certain way to avoid the restitution. You could put some of the money in a trust for your partner, but a determined creditor, even if it couldn't reach the principal, could get an order attaching any money or property that was distributed from the trust. You could leave all to daughter, and trust her to take care of Mom.

An asset protect trust sounds like it would be your best bet and would accomplish everything you are trying to do. Look for an Estate Planning Attorney in your area.

Your situation is a bit complicated but it is certainly one that occurs time to time. You are correct in taking your partner's name off of any assets that you own together. You don't mention in your description of the problem whether this is a same-sex marriage or a traditional marriage. I am guessing that because you referred to your "partner" instead of referring to her as "wife," that this is a same-sex union. At the present time, Missouri does not recognize same sex marriages so any assets that you owned jointly with your partner would be ordinary joint tenancy with right of survivorship as opposed to tenancy by the entirety (which would protect jointly owned assets in a situation such as yours). Probably the best scenario would be to create a trust with assets other than your retirement assets and restrict the circumstances under which your partner would have access to the funds. You would want to make certain that the trust included a "spendthrift" clause which would prevent your partner from anticipating her interest in the trust. You really need to seek the assistance of an estate planning attorney because these types of trusts have to be carefully drafted so as not to give too much control over the assets to your partner. It is this ability to control the assets which determines whether or not the party or parties to whom restitution must be made can obtain access to those assets. The trust could also include provisions for your partners daughter though apparently she is an adult and not entitled to mandatory support from her parent.

You need to do some estate and asset planning, and therefore need to take all of the details to an attorney for advice and counsel as to what you can do, and the benefits and detriments of each potential action.

You can leave the daughter as beneficiary and have her take care of her mother, as she sees fit. The only other alternative I see would be to set up a discretionary trust that would allow your partner to receive some funds, but the remaining funds would be sheltered from creditors. This should be set up by an attorney to make sure it is done right.

Create a living trust and deposit assets into the living trust. The living trust could benefit your partner with the income generated. The principal of the trust could be accessed for the benefit of your partner at the discretion of the trustee. The principal of the trust would be protected from creditors by a spendthrift clause in the trust. You must be very careful with the beneficiary designation of deferred income assets, like your 401K, to ensure limiting the tax consequences that could occur on with a distribution on death. It is possible to have a trust as the designated beneficiary with proper planning.