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Inheritance Appeals

Sullivan & Worcester

LePage v. Mobile Infirmary Association: Alabama Wrongful Death of a Minor Statute Applies to Cryogenically Preserved Embryos

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Carole M. Bass and Cara Koss co-authored this article. The authors have long raised as an issue the impact personhood legislation could have on assisted reproduction and, by extension, on estate and trust administration...more

Downey Brand LLP

Court of Appeal Caps Pretrial Attachment in Financial Elder Abuse Cases

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Plaintiffs who sue for financial elder abuse run the risk that defendants will spend ill-gotten gains before they can be recovered. To address this problem, the California Legislature gave plaintiffs the opportunity to...more

Downey Brand LLP

Look Before Leaping Into an Anti-SLAPP Motion

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Suing the suer is a common strategy in California civil litigation. A special motion to strike, known as an anti-SLAPP motion, can be a powerful weapon against such retaliatory litigation. We have explained the use of such...more

Burns & Levinson LLP

I Want to Contest My Parent’s Will. What Is the Process?

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While still grieving the death of your mother, you receive a Notice from the Probate and Family Court informing you that your good-for-nothing brother has filed a Petition for Probate seeking to be appointed as Personal...more

Winstead PC

Texas Supreme Court Holds That A Beneficiary May Not Accept Any Benefit From A Will And Then Later Challenging The Will

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In In the Estate of Johnson, a child of the decedent accepted over $143,000 from the decedent’s estate and then decided to challenge the will due to mental capacity and undue influence. No. 20-0424, 2021 Tex. LEXIS 426 (Tex....more

Downey Brand LLP

Daughter Liable for Interfering with Stepmother’s Inheritance

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Intentional interference with expected inheritance (IIEI) was recognized as a legal claim in California about eight years ago in Beckwith v. Dahl (2012) 205 Cal.App.4th 1039. Last week, the Court of Appeal issued the first...more

Downey Brand LLP

Showdown at the O.K. Corral – The Battle of the Omitted Heirs

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Providing for your children is one of the primary purposes of estate planning, but what happens to your carefully crafted trust if you had children you did not know about when you created the trust? Or, what if you have...more

Downey Brand LLP

Mind Your Notice in California – Even Remote Contingent Beneficiaries May Need to Be Served

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It’s unremarkable that California courts require that notice be given to affected beneficiaries in trust and probate proceedings. After all, the Fourteenth Amendment guarantees that no person will be deprived of life,...more

Gray Reed

Family History Guides Interpretation of a Texas Will

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Generally, if your will leaves your beloved “all … right, title and interest in and to”, said beloved would receive the entirety of your interest, whether a surface estate, mineral estate, or both. But in ConocoPhillips, et...more

Goulston & Storrs PC

Probate & Fiduciary Litigation Newsletter: February 2020

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The Probate & Fiduciary Litigation Newsletter compiles recent Trust & Estate cases.  Brother Gets the Cat – and Not Much Else - Where the decedent left his brother his “beloved old cat” and a small sum of money, and...more

Downey Brand LLP

Your Slice of the Pizza – Only Directly Inherited Asset Qualifies as Separate Property

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It is widely understood in California that inherited assets, unlike assets earned from labor, are the separate property of the receiving spouse.  But what if the assets do not come directly from a parent and instead pass from...more

Farrell Fritz, P.C.

LLC Survives Member’s Death. Dissolution Petition Doesn’t.

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In 2018, two members of a realty holding LLC sought judicial dissolution based on the death of one of the other members. The operating agreement defines a member’s death as an event of “Dissociation.”...more

Downey Brand LLP

California Probate Administration Is No Time for Napping

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In the absence of a trust that allows assets to pass without opening probate, the California probate process lasts for at least six months and can run much longer depending on the size of the estate and the nature of assets....more

Downey Brand LLP

When Defending Becomes Offensive: California Court Expands No Contest Clauses to Defense of Invalid Amendment

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No contest clauses are included in wills and trusts to discourage dissatisfied beneficiaries from challenging the document’s validity. Because enforcement of these clauses results in disinheritance, the California Probate...more

Goulston & Storrs PC

Probate & Fiduciary Litigation Newsletter – April 2019

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Disinherited Children Lose Challenge to Mother’s Will in New York Surrogate’s Court - Matter of Loe, 2019 WL 657041 (N.Y. Sur. Feb. 13, 2019) - Can disinherited children challenge their mother’s will based on possible...more

Downey Brand LLP

Probate Code Provides Ground Rules for Who Gets What from Wills and Trusts

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Many California will and trust disputes arise from ambiguity in the document with respect to who is entitled to an asset. Maybe the document was hazy from the start or perhaps circumstances have changed such that the rightful...more

Bennett Jones LLP

Discouraging Family Fights from the Grave

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If you are a beneficiary in a will that contains a no-contest clause, and you don't like what the will directs, be careful before you question its validity. You just might lose everything....more

Goulston & Storrs PC

Probate and Fiduciary Litigation Newsletter – February 19, 2019

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Welcome to our first newsletter of 2019! Leighton v. Hallstrom, 94 Mass. App. Ct. 439 (2018) - In Leighton, the Appeals Court vacated a final decree of the Plymouth Probate and Family Court settling an intestate estate....more

Winstead PC

Court Affirms Judgment That Power-Of-Attorney Holder Converted Funds By Withdrawing Them From A Joint Account

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In Fletcher v. Whitaker, a brother withdrew $25,000 from a joint bank account while the owner of the funds (decedent) was still alive. No. 02-17-00138-CV, 2018 Tex. App. LEXIS 8329 (Tex. App.—Fort Worth October 11, 2018, no...more

Winstead PC

A. A Fractured Texas Supreme Court Holds That There Is No Tortious Interference With Inheritance Claim In Texas

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In Archer v. Anderson, Jack, who had no children, executed a will leaving his estate to his brother and his brother’s children, the Archers. No. 16-0256, 2018 Tex. LEXIS 611 (Tex. June 22, 2018). ...more

Winstead PC

Texas Supreme Court Will Decide Whether Texas Recognizes A Tortious Interference With Inheritance Claim

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In Anderson v. Archer, the trial court’s judgment awarded the plaintiffs $2.5 million in damages based on a tortious interference with inheritance claim. No. 03-13-00790-CV, 2016 Tex. App. LEXIS 2165 (Tex. App.—Austin March...more

Goulston & Storrs PC

T&E Litigation Newsletter - November 2016

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There has not been much case law of particular relevance in the T&E area since our last newsletter, but three recent federal court decisions—one from the First Circuit Court of Appeals, and two from the United States District...more

Winstead PC

Another Court Holds That Texas Has Not Recognized A Tortious Interference With Inheritance Claim

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In Anderson v. Archer, the trial court’s judgment awarded the plaintiffs $2.5 million in damages based on a tortious interference with inheritance claim. No. 03-13-00790-CV, 2016 Tex. App. LEXIS 2165 (Tex. App.—Austin March...more

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