- Court refuses undue influence estate caveat removal
A caveat can be lodged in the court registry against the issue of a grant of probate or letters of administration. The applicant for the grant then needs to decide whether to…
10-04-2023
- Court disqualifies eligible applicant; independent administrator preferred
A court is often asked to decide who of several prospects be appointed to administer an estate or whether an independent administrator is preferable. This might happen where all those named in…
01-03-2023
- De facto spouse status dispute: court injuncts estate admin till issue is tried
Surviving spouses – including de facto spouses - receive a bulk of their partner’s estate if they die without a will. But what features are required to be established to prove a…
07-10-2022
- DIY wills do battle: testator signs would-be witness’s name
Wills - including DIY wills - are required to be signed, dated and formally witnessed. But what happens when they aren’t? Peter Boyle - a Central Queensland business owner - was 81…
07-10-2022
- Statutory will claim: Testator hesitation may lead to government windfall
The procrastination that accompanies the need to put one’s estate in order is notorious. Consider the case of a wealthy deceased whose indecision has a good chance in resulting in her multimillion-dollar…
08-09-2022
- Brothers do battle: mother’s will excluding one, prepared by other’s lawyer
The party who seeks to propound a will must establish that the will maker had the requisite legal capacity at the time the will was made and knew and approved the contents…
18-07-2022
- Reckoning relationship end date: implications for intestacy claims & FPA
What are the factors that might allow a court to conclude that a de-facto relationship has – for the purposes of family provision applications or intestacy claims – ended. That issue was…
15-06-2022
- Court orders graceful end to 12 year dispute between executors
A prolonged estate administration has been ended by order of a court on the application of one executor over the objections of another. Marilyn Plath of Childers died in September 2010 survived…
09-06-2022
- Solicitor bumps high bar; conflict transaction unwound but carer wins further provision
A solicitor who took instructions from an elderly patient to allow the sale proceeds of her family home to be used by her daughter to simultaneously acquire another in her own name,…
05-12-2021
- Lost original fuels forgery suspicion in practitioner siblings’ trust deed battle
A Queen St solicitor who belatedly produced an electronic copy of an unwitnessed declaration of trust to support his claim he was the beneficial owner of his deceased mother’s home, has been…
07-11-2021
- Solicitor’s records deficient: lost will held not to have been revoked
A court has ruled that the mere fact an original will could not be found did not compel the conclusion the will-maker had revoked it by destruction. Prem Masih and wife Patricia…
13-10-2021
- Carer/daughter’s undue influence house and bank transfers unwound
Several dubious family asset transfers prior to the death of a Maryborough octogenarian that favoured one daughter over her two siblings have been unwound by a Supreme Court in circumstances of undue…
05-10-2021