Legal Question in Wills and Trusts in Georgia

Your first step is to hire a lawyer. Have him examine the filing in the case and determine if you should do anything.

A later will made right before death may or may not have been properly done, so there is a lot of homework. Your focus is completely off-base. The taxes are not the issue, there is no such thing as placing things in a land bank, etc. So the fact that you have no understanding of the process and say that you want to not raise eyebrows (when you file in court you raise LOTS of those) shows how badly you need a lawyer. With an estate that big you should have done that over a year ago. You could be too late. Act today and when you cal the lawyer do not use the made-up terms you used in your post. Simply say you suspect there was a later will not presented to the court and ask what a lawyer recommends.

Your question doesn't make sense and jumbles too much together.

First, I don't know what you mean by a "land bank." Do you mean some kind of a trust? Why is there a "conservatorship"? A conservator is appointed when a person is still alive if they are not mentally competent to manage their own properrty. If your father died, that means he either set up a revocable living trust in his lifetime or else he set up a testamentary trust in his will if the land is in some kind of trust.

A property's value will depend on the amount of taxes that the county assesses. I have no idea if this is swamp land, farmland, land in a prime location or whether its developed or not so I have no idea if the taxes are too much or too little. I don't know if some kind of lesser rate applies (there may be a program to reduce taxes for senior citizens or for farmland txeo pay a lesser rate) and I don't know why this is even relevant without more facts. In and of itself the taxes have no bearing on whether the will is valid or whether someone is up to no good.

What Attorney Ashman says is correct. You and your sister need to get a copy of the estate file in the county/state where your father's estate is probated. The will and file are matters of public record and you do not need an attorney to get a copy of the file. Take the file and a copy of the alleged later will to a probate litigation attorney and ask whether the second will is valid and, if so, find out the likelihood of success a caveat proceeding, what it is going to cost and who will benefit by such action.

You will have to determine what the first will says and see who benefits and what the second will says and who benefits. If the second will is valid, then its going to control. If the second will is not valid it may nevertheless be enough to revoke the first will. If you succeed in getting that tossed out, you then need to determine who would take under the intestacy laws. You also need to see what assets are in the estate. The land is worth a nice chunk of change but I do not know what other assets there are and whether it will be worthwhile. Depending on what the probate lawyer says, it may or may not be cost effective to pursue a caveat proceeding.

Litigation is very very expensive and you and your sister may or may not have the resources.

You claim that your brother and his lawyer "hid" the second will. Now, what facts do you have to support this? Its a crime in most places to conceal a will. How do you know that it was in fact the lawyer as opposed to your brother lying to the lawyer? I also don't know about the second will, when it was done or how it came in to being. It might have been perfectly reasonable for the lawyer and your brother to have decided the second will was not valid.

I don't know the circumstances but I am not as quick as you to launch allegations that there was some nefarious plot. Personally, I am skeptical of wills made just before a person's death as usually are the product of greedy relatives.

Assuming that there was some deliberate effort to conceal the will, then you need to seek criminal charges. Wherever the lawyer is admitted, there is a state disciplinary board and they are charged with enforcing the state rules. If it was shown that the lawyer deliberately helped your brother conceal a valid will (and this is a big IF as much is not known) then in that case, file a complaint with the discipllinary authorities and file criminal charges with law enforcement.