Legal Question in Wills and Trusts in Arizona

what does a demand for an accounting look like?

and what happens if a newer notarized will is destroyed and no copies are found?


Asked on 3/12/11, 5:51 am

1 Answer from Attorneys

Donald Scher Donald T. Scher & Associates, P.C.

The demand is made in the form of a petition to the court to order the representative of the estate to account for the assets, liabilities, income and expenses of the estate. A will, unless handwritten, requires a witness and notarization of the signatures of the maker of the will and the witnesses. If you can't find copies or have a witness who can testify what provisions of the will contained, then it does not seem possible to prove that a will existed in the first place, and even if it was proven destroyed, the court won't guess at what the will may have contained. You would have to prove that the maker of the will didn't destroy it, and that someone else did, and then maybe you could take court action and prevent the person who destroyed the will from taking anything from the estate, at all.

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Answered on 3/13/11, 9:44 pm


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