The Mystery of the Millionaire Hermit

When a person dies alone without an easily ascertainable will nor family, the public administrator of the county is dispatched to determine the individual’s estate. He or she has the authority to enter the person’s home (after the coroner has taken care of the body) to rummage through the person’s belongings to see if they can find the next of kin, a will, or any other clue as to how to disperse what the person left on the Earth.

But when Dale Tisserand and Melani Rodrigue of Corning, California entered the two-bedroom home the recently deceased Eugene Brown on August 22, 2015, they were ready for the usual decay of a person on the edges of society. Those that pass away all alone have usually let their lives – and homes – get away from them before they themselves pass on. But to the administrators surprise, they found a neat, tidy, and sparse house and every sign that its inhabitant was strictly frugal. There were no electronics in the home except for an old-fashioned radio, and the man’s room only contained a foam bedroll and a military duffel bag containing a uniform and medals.

The other bedroom was empty except for a metal filing cabinet. Within that cabinet resided the evidence that Brown had a sizeable estate of $2.7 million, but alas, they found no will, so it was the administrators’ job to discover the man’s intent. Tisserand and Rodrigue discovered that he had never married and had no children, and his two siblings had long passed away. He had been born in San Jose in 1922, and had kept precise details of every dollar he had made, starting when he was 18 for a Norwegian shipping company making $18 a month. He moved into his home in the 1970s, and was alone it that small house for 39 years. But he did call his investment advisor, Richard Mazur, every morning and every night for years. Upon learning of Brown death, Mazur cried so hard he had to hang up with the administrator.

But Mazur did give them one clue to the elusive, rich hermit: he was a devout Catholic. In the filing cabinet was a brochure entitled titled Making Your Will: A Good Steward’s Guide, published by Catholic Relief Services, an international aid group, and a Merrill Lynch form designating the nonprofit as the sole beneficiary of his investments. Brown filled out the form four days before his death—but had not signed it.

The only person that attended Brown’s military burial – with a full-gun salute – was an assistant funeral director who also happened to live on the same street as Brown. Three nephews and a niece finally surfaced after two of them learned of their uncle’s death from an heir finding firm, which will take a third of the estate awarded to their clients. One claimed that he had visited his uncle from time to time, though there is no proof of that, but the other three admit they had not seen their uncle in 50 years. Nonetheless, 2 siblings received $387,000 each and the other 2 received $193,000 each, instead of the Catholic Church which may have been Brown’s intent.

See Claire Martin, The Mystery of the Millionaire Hermit, Bloomberg Businessweek, April 27, 2019.

Special thanks to Lewis Saret (Attorney, Washington, D.C.) for bringing this article to my attention.