You'd Be Surprised Who Can File For Probate
An attorney gets a judgement against a client for $300k. But then the client dies before he can collect. What does he do? How does he get paid?
The client died without a will. She had one adult child. The chlid didn't ask for probate proceedings. So about a year after client died, the lawyer had one of his employees petition to administer the client's estate. The son received notice and filed many objections but never requested to administer the estate himself. It did not appear he had an attonrey at this time.
Because there wasn't really any opposition, the attorney's employee was appointed administrator with limited authority.
This was clearly done so the attorney could attempt to collect on his $300k debt.
Client had filed a lawsuit against her attorney over ten years earlier. Attorney filed complaint against hger. But she was uncooperative and there was a default jdugment for attorney for $177k. With intererst charges that had increased to $300k.
Client said attorney was a stalker, elder abuser, and predator. She said she was deathly ill and could not leave home and therefore couldn't cooperate but never provided medical proof of this. it was unclear whether she could speak english. She said she couldn't. Client also tried to disqualify the judge.
It appears that client was not represented by an attorney but that her son was acting as her representative and doing significant actions behind the scenes.
Son is still arguing the whole debt is improper. But they already lost that.
It doesn't matter if there is a trust. Or that employee had not idea of the value of the estate.
anyoe can be an administrator.
the creditor claim still has to be approved by the judge.
Client was also involved in son's divocrce, where son was declared a vexious. litigant. A significant history of filing lawsuits.
Alternate timeline #1
It's unclear what the background is, but both of these parties are in all or nothing mode. They should have settled while she was alive.
There's no clear information of what the estate is worth and how much the attorney might get. The time and money spent on the matter is probably not worth the return.