Probate lawyers arrested for representing client disinherited by Georgia's Slayer Statute
If you practice in South Florida you've probably heard about the the indictment of Ben Kuehne, a former president of the Dade County Bar Association, former president of the Miami chapter of the Florida Association of Criminal Defense Lawyers and member of the Florida Bar Board of Governors. As explained here, Kuehne is being charged with money laundering for allegedly taking tainted funds for fees.
What's scary for lawyers about the Kuehne indictment is that even if you apparently do everything right, you may end of getting arrested for simply doing your job. Sure, you may ultimately prevail, but you'll have to live through the personal nightmare of being arrested and charged with a crime.
I thought of the Kuehne indictment when I read Lawyers Accused Of Stealing From Murder Victim's Estate; reporting on two Georgia lawyers who were arrested and apparently spent at least one night in jail after their client was forced to forfeit estate assets under Georgia's Slayer Statute. Here's the report:
Two Carroll County lawyers were indicted Thursday by a Douglas County Grand Jury on charges related to theft from the estate of a murder victim.
Candice Rader and Valerie Cooke, attorneys for Debra Post, were each indicted on 6 counts of Theft by Taking and one count of Theft by Receiving.
Post was charged in September of 2002 with murdering her husband Jerry Post.
This is the first known Georgia criminal case where charges were based upon Georgia's "Slayer's Statute", O.C.G.A. 53-1-5, which prohibits a person who kills another from inheriting assets from the murder victim.
The GBI investigation determined that Rader and Cooke knowingly took assets which belonged to the estate of Jerry Post as payment for their legal fees associated with their representation of Debra Post. The assets included life insurance proceeds to Post and real property deeded over to Rader and Cooke by Post. The total value of these assets is over $320,000.
The case was presented to the grand jury by Special Prosecutor Brown Mosely who will handle the prosecution of the two lawyers.
On September 12, 2003, six months after Jerry Post's assets were turned over to Rader and Cooke, Post pled guilty to felony murder and is now serving a life sentence without parole.
Cooke and Rader were arrested late yesterday in Carrollton by GBI agents and taken to the Douglas County Jail. They were scheduled to appear in Douglas County Magistrate Court at 10 a.m. Friday morning.
Lesson learned?
When it comes to staying out of trouble, spotting your risk exposures is half the battle (it's the "unknown unknowns" that will get you). The Georgia case gives probate attorneys something else to worry about (as if we didn't have enough already). If your fees could in any way be characterized as tainted by criminal conduct, you need to assume the worst and take appropriate precautions. As the Georgia lawyers learned, just because you're the friendly neighborhood probate attorney (and not some high profile criminal defense attorney), doesn't mean you can't get put in jail for doing your job.
Blogging credit:
Credit goes to the Wills, Trusts & Estates Prof Blog for bringing the linked-to Georgia article to my attention in the blog post entitled Attorneys for murderer charged under slayer statute.
