Dan Seigel is an experienced trusts and estates litigator who just published an article in the Florida Bar Journal entitled Creative Strategies for Defending Cases Involving Tortious Interference With Inheritance Expectation Claims. Dan’s article is a must read for practitioners. It’s both thorough on the legal theories underlying these cases and practically focused on converting those abstract concepts into concrete tools litigators can use in real life. Good stuff, highly recommended. Here’s an excerpt:
Over the last few years, an increasing number of cases have been filed in which plaintiffs assert a claim for tortious interference with inheritance expectation (TI) to recover assets that are not distributed under the operative will or revocable trust. This upward trend does not appear to be waning. The reasons for the proliferation of such claims include, but are not limited to, the ability to potentially expedite tort claims (which effectively bypass the estate or trust administration), minimize the number of necessary parties to the litigation, and obtain the right to a jury trial. These factors often have the effect of increasing the settlement value of a plaintiffs case.
TI is a relatively new tort, and few cases have actually made it to a jury trial. Thus, little case law exists with respect to many of these issues. For example, few cases analyze whether a judge must resolve equitable claims when a plaintiff requests a jury trial seeking monetary damages arising from the same facts as the equitable claims.
Unlike cases involving equitable claims, cases involving TI claims present opportunities for motions and other creative strategies. This article discusses several strategies that a defense practitioner should consider pursuing during the pendency of these cases.
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Invariably, a plaintiff will attempt to increase the value of the TI claim by: 1) having a jury adjudicate equitable claims that are traditionally determined by a judge; 2) having the issue of damages adjudicated simultaneously with liability; and 3) introducing inflammatory and arguably irrelevant evidence in front of jurors. The attorney defending a TI claim should utilize all available motion practice and litigation strategies to ensure that the defendant is not disadvantaged at trial and to obtain the best possible result.