Throughout 2016, the public witnessed several high-profile estate disputes, but which ones truly captivated our attention? First and foremost, Prince died in April 2016 without a will, which has left the probate judge fighting off several self-proclaimed heirs. Prince’s death highlights the most basic estate-planning lesson of all time—create an estate plan! Another interesting estate dispute was that of Frank Sinatra, Jr., who passed away in March 2016. At the time of his death, Sinatra, Jr. and his then-ex-wife were not married, but she was under the impression they were in a common law marriage; it was not until he stopped paying her alimony payments that she decided to file for divorce a second time. After appealing the lower court’s decision, Sinatra, Jr. passed away, which presents the next lesson—ensure careful planning to mitigate any frivolous claims. The passing of Jose Fernandez evinces another estate-planning misfortune. Fernandez’s girlfriend was pregnant at the time of his death but was not indicated as a beneficiary of his trust. Now, his girlfriend is left to rely on any hopes she has of the child being ruled as a pretermitted child under state law. And finally, Tom Clancy passed away in 2013, but 2016 saw significant litigation for his estate. Essentially, Clancy set up several trusts and signed a codicil that unintentionally shifted the entire tax burden to his four children’s trusts, as to maximize the estate tax amount under the marital exemption, leaving his children with an $11.8 million tax bill. Estate planners should beware of drafting language that can be construed as ambiguous. Hopefully, the planners of 2017 will learn from these public estate-planning blunders.
See Will Sleeth, Top Four Estate Disputes of 2016, Wealth Management, January 31, 2017.
Special thanks to Jim Hillhouse (Professional Legal Marketing (PLM, Inc.)) for bringing this article to my attention.
