Risking it all for Dad? Or, for a bigger piece of the pie?
The daughter of oilman Alfred C. Glassell Jr., founder of Transcontinental Gas Pipe Line Co., is contesting his will in a Texas probate court saying he was manipulated by his lawyers to leave most of $500 million fortune to charity.
Glassell executed a will in 1998, which left his daughter, Curry, and her two sons more than $100 million. But she is challenging his 2003 will, believed to be the final one Glassell signed before his death last year, which transfers most of his money to Houston’s Museum of Fine Arts and to a family foundation run by Curry’s younger half-brother.
The probate lawyers trying the case told the jury panel that Glassell must be declared mentally incompetent at the time he signed the 2003 will for it to be invalidated.
This is a big risk for Curry as the 2003 will contains a broad no-contest clause. If Curry doesn’t win her fight in probate court, she forfeits her entire inheritance, which is roughly one-tenth the size of the one bequeathed to her in the 1998 will – still a sizable chunk of change.
The state of California gives full force to no-contest clauses with a few exceptions, and they can be especially beneficial where family dynamics are tumultuous.
A no-contest clause is a provision in a will, trust, or other estate-planning instrument to the effect that a beneficiary who contests the instrument forfeits any gift made by the instrument. It is intended to reduce litigation by disappointed beneficiaries.
California law includes probable cause exceptions for menace, duress, fraud, or undue influence where a beneficiary who challenges the document with probable cause would not be subject to forfeiture under the clause.
Curry doesn’t have that protection. If she prevails in her challenge, she may nullify his 2003 will and have the 1998 will declared valid.
Or she could lose everything.
James D. Perry.
Tags: blended families, estates, Probate, wills
