Bay Area Estates and Tax Law Blog

This story hardly seems surprising. Reportedly, the central idea inherent in a trust -- one party’s holding property of potentially varied types for the benefit of another -- goes back many centuries.

One recent article on the broad and effective role that trusts often play in estate administration states that those planning tools might have first been authored “when nobles went off to do battle in the Crusades” more than 700 years ago. Departing fighters entrusted their assets to someone they could trust -- logically enough, a trustee -- for safekeeping in their absence or in the event they died in far off lands.

One-of-a-kind musical legend James Brown was something to behold on a stage when the music kicked in. And a recent Forbes article notes that even now, nearly a dozen years after his death, legions of people still regard the pop/soul icon “with rapt fascination.”

Brown died in late 2006, leaving an estate plan that he hoped would be duly sorted through and settled in timely fashion and without material issues.

Avid watchers of television crime dramas have undoubtedly run across one or more shows centered on acrimonious family disputes involving a testator's will. Such offerings often spotlight alleged wrongdoing of a serious nature that now promises results so-called will contestants say were not remotely intended by the instrument's creator.

Concededly, a will contest can sometimes be a fiery and ornery affair, with some underhanded and flatly illegal conduct being involved that did indeed thwart a testator's intent. Conversely, though, and in many other cases, a contest might involve something a bit more pedestrian than that. A will might be challenged because it was arguably not properly witnessed. Maybe its drafting particulars did not duly comply with state law requirements. Perhaps there is some issue relevant to its signing.

The phrase “alleged disinheritance” is likely to command attention in any final estate plan accounting, with that certainly being the case where a celebrity is concerned.

Burt Reynolds unquestionably qualifies for that title, with that actor being a Hollywood mainstay and box-office draw for several decades. Reynolds died earlier this month. Similarly with musical icon Aretha Franklin, who also died recently, his estate planning details are eliciting some public attention in the wake of his passing.