Estate Kouvakas; Lucas v Konakas

Solicitors: IR: Uther Webster & Evans MR: NSW Trustee and Guardian (C Phang) Public Guardian: NSW Trustee (C Phang) File Number(s): 2015/00188706

Judgment - EX TEMPORE

1. These proceedings concern the estate of GR who died on 15 May 2015, aged 86, leaving: 1. a widow MR, aged 83 and presently a "protected person" within the meaning of the New South Wales Trustee and Guardian Act 2009 NSW by virtue of orders made by the Guardianship Division of NCAT, varied by orders of this Court made on 24 August 2015, the subject of reasons for judgment published as IR v AR [2015] NSWSC 1187 (21 August 2015, with addendum 31 August 2015); 2. two adult sons, IR (born in 1961, now aged 54 years) and AR (born in 1969, now aged 46 years); 3. a will dated 27 March 2007; and 4. a will dated 3 March 2015.
2. Both wills provide for the widow of the deceased to be his sole beneficiary. The earlier will appoints his widow as executrix. The latter will appoints AR as executor.
3. There is no dispute as to the validity of the earlier will but for its purported revocation by the latter will.
4. Controversy attaches to the validity of the later will because: 1. its execution was evidently secured by AR, apparently in the belief that he is beneficially entitled to the whole of the estates of his parents by virtue of a controversial "life contract" allegedly executed by his parents, in his favour, in Croatia. 2. some time before the 2015 will was purportedly executed, AR appropriated to himself approximately $1 million of the proceeds of sale of land owned by his parents in Sydney, and he refuses to explain the whereabouts of that money (which he transferred out of Australia) or to prove his entitlement to retain it. 3. AR has appeared in these proceedings by a solicitor from time to time, but he has generally eschewed representation by lawyers, and insisted upon a presumed entitlement to participate in the proceedings, or not, on his own terms and as, when and how he pleases. 4. AR has failed to comply with a direction given by the Court on 12 October 2015 that he file and serve a written outline of the case he seeks to make concerning the future course of these proceedings, including his case referable to the following questions: 1. whether the deceased did or did not possess testamentary capacity to make the will dated 3 March 2015. 2. whether he (AR) claims any, and if so, what relief in these proceedings in relation to the "lifetime contract" said to have been signed by his parents. 3. whether he (AR) is, or is not, prepared to submit to orders for there to be a full accounting by him to the court for his receipt of, and dealing with, property (including proceeds of sale of land of the order of $1 million) ostensibly the property of his parents. 1. in the absence of any explanation of a course of events by AR, there remains, at least, a reasonable suspicion that execution of the will dated 3 March 2015 by the deceased was procured by AR as part of steps taken by him, not in the interests or for the benefit of his parents or with their fully informed consent, but to appropriate their property to himself, to their detriment.