Are you the beneficiary of a Florida revocable trust and wonder if the trust has all the money it is supposed to have? Put another way, if your mom’s revocable trust leaves the trust equally to 4 children, do you think thesuccessor trustee took trust assets before the inheritance split? Did the successor trustee or Power of Attorney use the POA to transfer assets to himself instead of to the revocable trust which gets split evenly 4 ways? Consider reading a July 31, 2015 Ohio probate litigation case involving a POA, and a successor trustee who was found to have committed concealment and embezzlement. This case makes you ask: if your brother or sister took money from dad, how do you really tell if it was embezzlement or a gift or a loan?
Did your brother take dad’s money or was it a gift?
- How many times has this happened?
- A big fat check $$ ends up with mom or dad’s successor trustee or guardian or POA.
- You ask yourself: how in the world did the power of attorney Lake Worth end up with that money when it was supposed be transferred into the Florida living trust and besplit evenly among brothers & sisters?
- You ask yourself: did mom or dad REALLY give that money to your brother, or did brother take that money when it’s supposed to be in their Florida revocable trust?
- Did someone use a Florida power of attorney transfer assets to themselves when themoney should be in dad’s revocable or living trust Boca Raton?
- Perhaps these are recurring probate issues which Palm Beach probate courts see again and again.
- Well, this recent July 31, 2015 probate and trust case out of Ohio demonstrates that siblings sue siblings in probate litigation in places other than Palm Beach County.
How do I know if my sister took my mom’s money or if my mom really make a gift to her?
- So, here are the three general rules of a valid Florida gift of money. This may help you understand if your sister embezzled mom’s assets or if mom really made a gift of money to your sister.
- Understand that Palm Beach probate courts look very closely (scrutinize) a power of attorney who transfers assets to herself.
- Palm Beach probate courts scrutinize a successor trustee who says that mom made gifts to her right before mom died in Florida, when that money would normally go into her revocable trust.
- First, was there delivery of the money or was it embezzled?
- Two, was there acceptance of the so called Florida gift?
- Third, was there donative intent?
- Did mom intend to make a gift of money to your sister and NOT put the money in her revocable trust Florida?
- What evidence suggests that it was a gift? Who testifies about the gift? Who testifies other than the power of attorney sister who took the money, or the successor trustee who took the money?
- Or, put another way, what evidence suggests that a probate court Delray Beach would find that it was embezzlement Florida? What witnesses or documents, like a cancelled check from a time when mom was in the hosptital or sick with dementia, would suggest that the successor trustee or power of attorney actually took mom’s money wrongfully?
- Finally, remember how to have a gift “voided” or reversed or set aside, and remember the new Florida laws on powers of attorney and a POA Florida making gifts to herselfor changing the beneficiary on a Florida bank account.
What does a case of trust or probate embezzlement look like?
- Leon Sr. was diagnosed with Lymphoma
- He hired a law firm to write a will and a trust, a revocable living trust
- His son, Jr., went to the law office with his father . (Isn’t that one of the Florida probate “Carpenter” factors of undue influence?)
- At the probate law firm, Jr. learned that his father, Sr., had $300,000 in assets
- Dad, Sr., singed a Revocable Living Trust Agreement
- Junior was the successor trustee of dad’s revocable living trust
- After Sr.’s death, the revocable trust become irrevocable
- The trust was supposed to be split evenly, 4 ways, for 4 of Sr.’s 5 children, who were supposed to get equal inheritances from dad’s living trust
- Junior was named the executor of the will and Sr.’s son (Jr.) was also named power of attorney
- Jr. evidently had some financial problems apparently caused by gambling
- The son took $20,000 of dad’s money because his house was in foreclosure
- Was it a loan from dad? A gift of $20,000 from dad? Or was it embezzlement?
- On September 24, 2013, two checks totally $180,554.59 were desposited into joint checking accoutns for Jr. and his wife
- October 28, 2013: another $32,184 was deposited
- This Ohio probate opinion lists all the money that went for Jr’s benefit
- The trial court found Jr guilty of concealing and embezzling.
- To read more, look for the case called Bayes v. Dornon, Jr., No. 2014-CA-129, from the Court of Appeals of Ohio, Second District, Clark County.
- 2015 WL 4601010