Inheritance question

In My Humble Opinion
41

The way I mean it is, think of it as an indemnity.

Let’s assume that an inheritance per se is a privilege and not a right, that the father’s money was the father’s money and that, by default, he has the right to leave it to the dogs and cats if he wishes…OK…but, now, think about someone suing another person. If you take someone to court for damages, you are also asking them to be deprived of some of their money that they probably earned, figuratively speaking, by the sweat of their brow, to which, had they not caused you damage, you would have no claim to, and which doesn’t become your property until after the court rules in your favor. So not honoring a dead abuser’s last will that their abused child be left out of the inheritance would be kind of like suing the estate of the deceased for damages. It’s imperfect compensation, money won’t make up for sexual abuse or other abuse, but it’s something (think of the case where O. J. Simpson was found not guilty in criminal court of murdering his ex-wife and her lover, but at least the family got extensive damages in civil court. It won’t bring back the dead but at least he got partially held to account).

It’s not something in which I am an expert, and quite frankly I would need to refresh my memory but I recall reading about cases where someone contested a will where they were disinherited by e.g. an abusive father, and won, because they were able to convince the court that they were owed something due to having been abused (or maybe the line of reasoning was that the abusive father had maligned his child and that his reasons for disinheriting her were unfair, I don’t know for sure).

OTOH, I can see your point about justifing it from a different perspective, namely that, the father punished the sibling for accusing him and that, if he was guilty, it is wrong to punish the sibling by disinheriting her. It’s another way of looking at it.

Now, I won’t comment on whether the OP has any moral duty to right the wrong of the disinheriting. Did sibling ever consider contesting the will in court? (Perhaps sibling didn’t know that was a theoretical option, or found that it was not a practical or practicable option under the specific circumstances). I would suggest that, if they believe the accusations to be true, they might consider giving the sibling a portion of the inheritance that sibling might otherwise have gotten, or at least agree with her on some amount to be shared with her. I would leave my thoughts at that.

Agreed. Would be good to have a clearer idea as to whether OP believes sibling’s accusations.

42

I’m curious- for those who feel like there is a moral obligation to share, would you feel the same about significant gifts from the parents before they are deceased? What about it being a posthumous exchange makes it different?

43

If I felt a sibling was being treated unfairly by my parent, I would try to rectify the situation regardless of whether my parents were alive or dead.

Obviously families are complicated and unfair is not always clear so I can appreciate why someone else might act differently.

44

Parents are no longer alive to object. If my parents disinherited my siblings* and gave most of their assets to me before they died, I’d save it and then split it with my siblings when my parents finally did die. Or more likely I’d simply refuse to accept the gift - they can give it to charity if they want to be dicks about it.

*Actually my parents have made it very clear verbally that no matter what their wills say, they want everything split evenly. This is to cover their bases in case they don’t get around to updating their wills adequately to cover some random asset.

45

And often as a means to sow dissent between the survivors about who “deserves” what. Even if the accusation was false its still a shitty move because of the situation it has put the other siblings in.

For the o.p., unless you have some particular reason to believe that the disinherited sibling would squander the money or use it in a self-destructive way, you should consider gifting her a “fair” share in the interest of not fostering resentment.

Stranger

46

OP here. I really appreciate all the responses. Some more info:
I was too young to have any knowledge of the alleged abuse. As an adult, when sib2 made the accusations, which were based on recovered memories (now deemed unreliable by some experts), I took sib2’s side and served as a character witness at the trial. I stopped speaking with Dad and Stepmom for several years. Later, we made up and were on good terms for the rest of their lives.

I get along with everyone, but every conversation with Sib2 is a struggle for me. Life, to her, is full of resentment. She eventually cuts off everyone, always after deciding they’d been victimizing her in some way. She ended our relationship a few years ago, and my life has been less stressful since then. For these reasons I feel like I might not fairly consider her request for part of the inheritance, so I started this thread to get some less biased answers.
Please, keep them coming.

47

Thank you OP, this is the kind of information we would need in order to give answers more specific to your situation.

What I have bolded raises alarm bells to me. I have experience with this kind of behavior, unfortunately with my mother, whose narcissistic and obsessive behavior I have referred to before on SD. She is an extremely paranoid person, sees enemies around every corner, and misinterprets people’s honest and well-meant actions and comments as malicious and aimed at her, in a way that I think amounts to intellectual dishonesty, presenting herself as a virtuous victim and everyone else around her as selfish and defensive. Once when I was a student, she was berating me for something, and said to me: “When I am gone, you will be ALONE!” Fast forward to the present. I have so many friends that I have trouble juggling my social schedule, and she is alone with my father and has NO social contact apart form some distant relatives in the old country with whom she has some contact by phone.

I also once had a neighbor who had the exact same attitude. When I met her, she gave me a sob story about how she had been abused and stonewalled many times in her life and how there were multiple people predating on her. She indicated that she had certain existential problems and, without going into detail, I tried to help her as I was apparently more knowledgeable about the environment we were in than she was. Over the next six months, I experienced her making increasing unreasonable demands on my time and throwing guilt trips on me if I politely excused myself from honoring them, trying to make demands of my friends, telling me about how she gets free dinner once a week by attending a synagogue (even though she’s not Jewish) and then going to the rabbi’s house - and how she wished she could find a Jewish ancestor so that she could declare herself a Jew and get funds from the Jewish community. She also made unwarranted negative and critical remarks about various people, and would throw a hissy fit if called out on any of her behaviors. Eventually, I realized she was just a very negative person who would alienate those who tried to help her, only see evil in people, and that she would alienate those who wouldn’t let her use them. I broke contact with her.

Therefore, while I don’t know your sibling personally, what you describe would make me question her credibility. If there’s a pattern of her seeing herself as a victim of everyone around her, that is very suspect.

48

My grandmother cut my parent from her will for what seemed to me even as a child to be trivial and inexplicable reasons. It was a surprise to my parent when the new will was read. My predominant emotion about my grandmother since then has been digust and disappointment, and when I think of her, I think of this action more than anything else. My parent’s siblings could have redistributed the paltry amount and chose not to. This told me something important about their character as well. I had little to do with them after that because if you’re willing to go along with that sort of thing, in what other ways will you betray your intimates?

49

I have seen enough accusations of sex abuse hurled around - both credible and not credible - that I try not to have an opinion without knowing a lot more details than in this thread.

What does sib1 think? Did/does the sib think the accusations are credible? Does sib1 have sympathy for sib2? Is their relationship better than sib2 and the OP? For that matter, what’s the OP’s relationship with sib1.

If sib2 ended her relationship with the OP several years ago, did they have even sporadic contact since then, or did sib2 suddenly appear out of nowhere to demand a share of the inheritance?

In one case I know, the accuser was mentally ill, had been abusing her own child, and accused her husband of being the abuser. It’s sometimes very difficult to get to the root of the issue.

50

Oh God, she’s borderline. I really assumed the accusation was likely to be true, given my own history of abuse and the fact that I will never, ever be able to prove it happened. But my mother has borderline personality disorder and this is pinging my radar hard. It sounds like your sister is mentally ill. My Mom honestly believes all sorts of trauma happened to her that couldn’t have happened. Some of it really did. But a pattern of interpersonal instability combined with the incredibly suspect “recovered” memories? My inexpert advice is just stay away.

What I was going to say as an abuse survivor myself, is that it makes no sense to me whatsoever that money would in anyway rectify the wrong of abuse. That is such a bonkers take I didn’t know what to do with it.

But now it makes sense why she would think that. (Because she is fundamentally irrational.)

Yeah, don’t give her any money. I would have advised that you not give her the money even if she was abused. I think that’s such a shitty position to put someone in. She is not entitled to your money because she had a hard break.

51

Yep, borderline. Thankfully there are good treatments now, but they don’t do a damned bit of good if the person refuses to acknowledge there is a problem.

Last I talked to my mother she was nearly incoherent because she had to weave this vast tapestry of her personal trauma around every conversation to the point that it didn’t even make sense. At this point every single person in our family has made the independent choice to sever the relationship, including her own mother. The last data point I have with regard to her sanity was her talking about suing my Aunt because my Aunt gave some family photos to their cousin and their cousin posted the photos online.

I’m not without sympathy, but there needs to be a heap of self-preservation when dealing with a mental illness like this.

52

This is a good point. Shitty move by Dad. Still doesn’t obligate the siblings, IMO.

I am quite sure I’ve been disinherited. My mom is intensely paranoid that I’m going to go after her money when she dies, and try to take it from her husband, which is hilarious because a) it’s a trivial amount of money, b) I don’t need her money and c) there is absolutely nothing in my history to suggest I would ever do something like that.

But as my Aunt pointed out, my Mom is often paranoid about other people doing to her what she would do to them.

53

Is there a will? If so, go by what it says. If not, you could have issues. But if Dad did leave a will, if you wish you could give part of your share, if you so desire, to anyone.

54

Take it from someone who works for an agency providing sexual assault victims services: sexual assaults are almost always nearly impossible to prove. There is rarely visible injury even in the immediate aftermath of an assault, so even forensic evidence is limited, and in this case we’re talking years later. There’s a reason only about 5% of reported cases go to trial. And it isn’t because 95% are liars.

Every once in a while I have a daymare where I imagine getting sued by my abuser or otherwise put in a public position to have to prove it. Other than the fact that my story hasn’t changed and I’ve been in therapy for twenty years for PTSD, I’ve got nothing. My mom has unwittingly reinforced a lot of it because she eventually confessed she suspected it was happening and then arranged for me to be alone with him so she could confirm the truth but if she’s my reliable witness… I’m screwed. (According to the story she told in an attempt to defend herself, she listened to us through the door and the walls but never could confirm it was happening so she just did nothing while it went on six more years. My mother, ladies and gentlemen.)

55

Wait, she cut off her relationship with you, and now has come back to say, “you owe me money”? Really?

In my first reply, i said,

I now think the answer is that you want the relationship to be “as remote as possible”. She sounds toxic.

Also, i was thinking more about my SIL, the one who said she was abused by her uncle. My husband was the only family member who stayed on good terms with that uncle, and he was his uncle’s only heir. We had trouble finding his estranged son. My SIL did not want anything to do with anything of her uncle’s. She didn’t ask for money, she didn’t go to the funeral, she made it clear that she was happy he was now completely out of her life. That seems like a healthy response, honestly.

(The estranged son was grateful to be informed of his father’s death, and was happy to waive his right to contest the will, too.)

56

Oh my God. I’m so sorry for you.

57

I’m just glad the relationship is over and it doesn’t have to be my problem anymore.

I found her confession (which she truly believed to be the reason she shouldn’t be held responsible) quite reassuring in that my memories are accurate, the situation was exactly as fucked as I remember it being, and good riddance.

I don’t know (none of us know) whether sib2 was actually abused. Given the context of recovered memories, I’d say the odds are low. But research on borderline personality disorder indicates that it’s usually caused by being raised in a consistently invalidating environment, often by being scapegoated as the crazy one when the borderline victim reacts rationally to really messed up things. So chances are good her childhood was no picnic. And it’s very likely that she truly believes she was abused.

58

Yes! Who the hell wants money from their abuser? That’s something I genuinely do not understand. If my abuser left me money after he died, I’d probably be physically ill.

59

I’ve wondered this before as well - especially when you see news reports of some quite massive claims for compensation. It’s always said that money replace a person, or repair a damaged childhood so I suppose the money could go towards the costs of therapy or any other treatment required, so that in a way the wrongdoer is paying towards the other person’s recovery. In that way, it looks more like restitution than justice.

60

Spice calls sib2 borderline, puzzle deems her toxic. I suggest it is challenging for folk on a MB to accurately say whether she is pathological, a self-centered jerk, or something else.

IF sib2 has a mental illness, then her actions are presumably less under her control. I would suggest that if I really believed that, I might feel her more “deserving” of a “fair” share. OTOH, if OP is content to essentially have cut relations w/ sib2, then just forget about it and enjoy the $. Of course, IMO many folk have more trouble maintaining that position over time.