IOTA pioneer.

Henry Zapruder passed away January 24. Henry practiced law in Washington, D.C., and was not a Florida lawyer. His contribution to the poor, to law students, and to the administration of justice in Florida was inestimable, however.

When the Florida Supreme Court adopted a first-in-the-nation program for utilizing the interest from unproductive lawyers' trust accounts for the benefit of the poor and the improvement of the administration of justice, the program required a ruling from the IRS to become effective. The court, the Bar, and the Bar Foundation turned to Henry, a youthful but talented D.C. tax attorney, to attempt to get the necessary tax ruling. Henry was immediately receptive to the concept of the program, and worked with Florida's IOTA proponents on a pro bono basis.

The product of Henry's efforts was the tax opinion which made possible the implementation of IOTA in Florida, and the implementation of comparable programs (called IOLTA) in 49 other states and the District of Columbia. Henry's contribution to Floridians and residents throughout the U.S. did not stop there. He worked tirelessly and gratuitously in the years that followed with jurists, bar leaders, and legislators in other states to help them attain and preserve favorable income tax treatment for their distinctive IOLTA programs, both individually as called upon and generically as tax counsel to the ABA's IOLTA Commission. Henry also counseled attorneys throughout the United States who were defending IOLTA programs in the courts from relentless assaults...