The Helmsley Estate

[Jyn]

I'm hoping for input here from our some of our regulars who are more knowledgeable about legal proceedings.

http://www.comcast.net/articles/news...Helmsley.Dogs/

Now, my personal opinion is that this lady was ridiculous in leaving her estate to her dog and specifying that her money should all go to dog/animal-related charities. However, if it was explicitly stated in her will that that's what she wants done with her multi-billion dollar estate, then that is what should have happened.

Instead, her trustees only donated a fraction of the full value ($136 million according to the article) to charity. Of that fraction, they gave less than 1% to animal-related organizations, despite her will specifying that it should all go there.

I'm not a legal expert or at all familiar with how multi-billion dollar estates are handled, so I'm hoping one of you might be able to shed a little light on this situation. I don't know what's going on, but I do know that, if I were Helmsley, I'd be rolling over in my grave. There is no way that this could be what she meant in her will.

I guess it strongly disturbs me that it seems people can basically ignore what I want done with my money property after I'm gone, despite having a will.

[Malacasta]

Yeah, something similar was talked about in Oz recently by this writer (OMG, I can't let any of my friends know I linked to Andrew Bolt)
http://www.news.com.au/heraldsun/sto...000117,00.html

THINK you should have more say than a judge in deciding who gets your money when you're gone?

Yes, Brian Naylor thought so, too. Little did he -- or you -- know.

The former newsreader, who died in the Black Saturday fires, did not want his estranged son Greg to inherit a cent of his $20 million estate.

His will, drawn up last year, was adamant: "(Greg) has during my lifetime received considerable benefit from me and my associated entities and his actions have caused me substantial emotional and financial costs."

[Jyn]

Yeah, Mala, that story you linked makes me want to apply force to those judges' faces. If ghosts exist, and this happens to whatever I leave behind, I'm doing some serious haunting. I don't care if my estate is $500 and a scooter or $5 billion, it's the principle of the thing.

[Kraxe]

This is why you should all die loaded down with debt. Anyway, isn't that what the Governments of the world are doing on our behalf right now?