When Tom Petty died of a drug overdose 18 months ago, he was survived by his second wife, Dana York, and his two daughters from his first marriage, Adria and Annakim. Petty created a trust to administer and distribute his assets. He named his widow as the trustee. He also directed that his music rights and royalties be transferred to a company to be managed equally by his widow and daughters.
His wife believes “equally” means a 50/50 split of management while the daughters contend that “equally” means they each get a vote for 2/3 control. The eldest daughter has opposed a 25th anniversary release of Petty’s last good album, Wildflowers, and has flamed various members of his band and the City of Gainesville. His widow has petitioned the LA probate court to appoint a day to day manager of the estate and requested that Adria act respectably.
Several quick points:
1. No matter how much planning a person does, there is no guarantee that his heirs will behave after his death.
2. Second marriages are always ripe for irrational emotional reactions after a death.
3. The estate planning attorney likely wishes he had defined “equally” in the trust.
4. A bank trustee can sometimes diffuse some of a beneficiary’s distrust, but not always. And usually not with someone as ill tempered as Adria.
5. In the streaming music era, the expected windfall from the re-release of Wildflowers is illusory. No one under 50 buys CDs.
Photo Credit: NY Post? – vidcap
License: Fair Use/Education (from linked article)
Bit late with this, but I guest wrote Paul Daugherty’s The Morning Line blog for the Cincinnati Enquirer on Friday. I covered the debut of FC Cincinnati while being complimentary to Mick Cronin. I also recapped our February in Phoenix. I hope you enjoy it.
Comic License: Nick Galifianakis/Washington Post
License: Fair Use/Education
Gerald Cotten ran QuadrigaCX, one of Canada’s largest crytopcurrency exchange companies. Last month, the company announced that 30 year old Mr. Cotten died in early December of complications from Crohn’s Disease while building orphanages in India. The company also announced that $140 million of cryptocurrency was unavailable because all of the currency was stored on a laptop that only he had access to and no one knew the password. There is concern that the cryptocurrency will be locked on the laptop forever. However, digital forensic experts have questioned whether the currency is actually on the laptop and whether it was moved previously.
One planning point, one investment point, and a lot of shade.
1. This is a classic instance of making sure that your heirs can access your digital accounts after your death. I advise my clients to write down their passwords to prevent heirs from being locked out after death.
2. Cryptocurrency investments can be dangerous enough without trusting them to a twenty-something operating on a laptop out of his house in Nova Scotia.
3. Not to be a conspiracist, but I do question the legitimacy of reports of a young man dying of Crohn’s disease (mortality rate of 1%) while overseas doing charity work with the death reported a month later, and $140 million possibly missing and not simply locked on a computer. Feel free to call me a cynic, though.
Photo Credit: Benoit Tessier/Reuters
License: Fair Use/Education (from linked article)
Newtown police chief, Tom Synan, was featured in a video on USA Today’s sitea about his work on the front line combating opioid addiction and treating it as an illness and not as a crime. I am honored to call him a friend.
Photo credit: USA Today (actually it is a video)
License: Fair Use/Education (from the linked article)
Jeanne Calment has been considered the world’s longest lived person since she died at the age of 122 in 1997. She allegedly smoked until she could not light a cigarette without assistance. Recently, a Russian gerontologist and a Russian mathematician have questioned her longevity and floated the theory that Calment stole her mother’s identity for the purposed of avoiding French inheritance taxes in the 1930’s. Their theory is that she did not look or act that old. The result is that Calment was only 99 when she died.
Only three points:
1. I always enjoyed the part of Calment’s bio where she sold her apartment when she was 90 to a man who agreed to pay her a monthly sum until she died. She outlived him by two years so he wound up paying 2X for the real estate.
2. Like many points of French governance, the estate tax laws are complicated. Nonetheless, the tax rates are not so confiscatory that compliance merits identity theft as a means of avoidance.
3. Is there any type of disinformation campaign that Russians will not engage in?
Photo Credit: Reuters
License: Fair Use/Education
Best wishes for the new year. And no, Jack is not taller than me. 😊
I subbed for Paul Daugherty’s The Morning Line blog in the Cincinnati Enquirer yesterday. I reviewed the year in sports with a Cincinnati perspective. I hope you like it.
Photo Credit: Sarah Brookbank for Cincinnati Enquirer
License: Fair Use/Education (from linked article)
Melvin Dummar died this week. He was famous for having been named as a 1/16th beneficiary of Howard Hughes’ unwitnessed handwritten will which was known as “The Mormon Will.”
Dummar allegedly found a disheveled Hughes near a Nevada brothel and gave him a ride to The Sands hotel in 1967. After Hughes’ death in 1976, an unknown man delivered a letter to Dummar, who was then living in Utah, for forwarding to the Church of Latter Day Saints. Before delivering it, Dummars steamed it open and saw that he and the Mormon Church were listed as beneficiaries of the will. Hughes was not a Mormon, but Dummars was. The will was one of 40 wills purportedly made by Hughes none of which were deemed to be valid.
A valid will for Hughes was never found resulting in his fortune benefitting distant cousins and other relatives. Hughes reportedly did not want his relatives to benefit from his fortune. Dummar’s alleged encounter with Hughes was made into the award winning movie, “Melvin and Howard,” in 1980.
Several points:
1. As a single man with no children and no siblings, Hughes definitely should have prepared an estate plan to distribute his billions.
2. As a man who dated Katherine Hepburn, Ava Gardner, and Gloria Vanderbilt among others, it is doubtful that Hughes frequented a brothel hours from Las Vegas although the uncut hair and fingernails might have been a turn off..
3. If this incredible story were not already made into a movie, it screams of material that needs to be made into a movie.
Photo Credit: United Press International
License: Fair Use/Education (from linked article)
I previously noted that Glen Campbell’s 3 children from his second marriage were contesting his will which he signed in 2006. The will omitted them, likely due to their supporting their mother during her divorce from Campbell and later suing him over the publishing rights she received in the settlement. His 2001 will also omitted them. The children recently dropped their lawsuit.
A few points:
1. The lawsuit would have been difficult to win because Campbell made both wills long before he went public with his Alzheimer’s diagnosis.
2. Campbell’s estate was recently valued at $1.2 million which is way less than the original estimate of $50 million.
3. If the omitted children were successful in challenging Campbell’s estate plan, they would have inherited $100K each tops.
4. The money for recording artists is in the writing and publishing not the performing. Campbell generally performed songs written by others.
5. Three divorces, 8 children, and years of cocaine use are never conducive to accumulating wealth.
Photo credit: Larry McCormack/The Tennessean
License: Fair Use/Education (from linked article)
Verne Troyer is the actor famous for playing Mini-Me in the Austin Powers movies. He committed suicide by alcohol poisoning in April. After ingesting the alcohol, he called 911 and told dispatchers he wanted to die. He was rushed to the hospital but died 3 weeks later. He left an estate valued at $150K. Just recently the hospital which treated him filed a claim against his estate for $360K.
Three small points:
1. In Ohio, a creditor has six months from the date of death to file a claim for payment against the estate. If the claim is not made, the estate does not have to pay the debt.
2. Debts must be paid before the beneficiaries receive any assets. Troyer’s heirs will not receive anything from his estate.
3. If there are insufficient assets to pay debts, the debts die with the decedent. The heirs are not responsible for them.
4. No snark when someone commits suicide.
Photo Credit: REX/Shutterstock
License: Fair Use/Education (from linked article)
I subbed for Paul Daugherty’s The Morning Line blog in the Cincinnati Enquirer again today. I touched on some recent sports deaths and firings, the basketball jerseys honoring Prince, and reviewed my favorite book of the year. I hope you enjoy it.
Photo Credit: Unknown
License: Fair Use/Education (from linked article)
A local story has a probate court angle. The City of Cincinnati has agreed to settle a lawsuit brought by an 11 year old shoplifter who was tasered after running from an off duty police officer. The young girl, who had been caught and warned previously for stealing from the same store, had $53 of stolen merchandise on her. She will receive $220,000 from the city and $20,000 from Kroger for the indignity of being tasered.
Several points and one prediction:
1. Because the girl is a minor, the settlement will be subject to probate court supervision until she turns 18.
2. Funds may only be spent with the approval of the probate court and then only for her mental health to overcome the trauma of being tasered.
3. She will have unrestricted access to the funds when she turns 18.
4. Call it more than a hunch that the number of shoplifting incidents at Kroger without repercussions will increase dramatically.
Photo Credit: Albert Cesare/Cincinnati Enquirer
License: Fair Use/Education (from linked article)