Divorce, then Death, then Determination

Our original client was a woman who finally had enough and was exploring the prospect of a divorce from an abusive husband. A few weeks after our divorce consultation, she was murdered by her husband. He was arrested the same day. Family members, aware that she had sought the advise of a lawyer came back to our office with the sad and tragic news.

We then advised a legal strategy to keep the husband from acquiring or using any of the marital property for his criminal defense.  We provided legal representation to the two young adult children to serve as co-executors on their mothers probate estate and to utilize complicated laws regarding survival actions, wrongful death suits by estate representatives, homestead statutes, the deadman statute, the slayer’s statute and other esoteric but vital legal maneuvers to position the children to prevent the father from grabbing and selling half of the estate to pay for his criminal defense for the murder of their mother.

The mother’s plans for divorce were tragically ended with her death.  But it was her children’s determination that prevented a subsequent tragedy.