Florida jury orders billionaire’s widow, son to pay $535 million after years-long inheritance war

A Palm Beach County jury awarded $535 million to the heirs of a Turkish billionaire who accused their stepmother and half-brother of stealing their inheritance.

Mehmet Tatlici, acting as a representative of his late father’s estate, sued his stepmother, Nurten Tatlici, and half-brother, Ugur Tatlici, in 2009 for allegedly siphoning assets that belonged to him and his two brothers.

Their father, Dr. Mehmet Salih Tatlici, died in February 2009 and left behind an estate worth more than $3 billion that included Istanbul’s iconic Tat Towers, hundreds of properties across Turkey and valuable Florida real estate.

According to Mehmet’s attorneys, Turkish inheritance law guarantees biological children a protected share of their parent’s estate that cannot be defeated either by wills or asset transfers. Under this system, children have an unbreakable claim to part of their parent’s wealth from birth, regardless of attempts to transfer assets away from them.

For more information see Hannah Phillips “Florida jury orders billionaire’s widow, son to pay $535 million after years-long inheritance war,” The Palm Beach Post, September 8, 2025.