Legal Question in Wills and Trusts in Georgia

You can dispute his actions. Having a power of attorney does not mean you can treat the person's assets as your own piggy bank. Consult with a lawyer as soon as possible to discuss the matter in full and challenge your step brother's actions.

Powers of attorney are for living people only. If your mother is deceased, then her agent under her power of attorney no longer has any duties other than to provide a final accounting to the executor of her estate and to turn any of her property over to the executor.

I have no idea why an agent would start closing bank accounts. This may or may not have been proper depending on how the checking account for your mother was titled. An estate needs probated for your mother and this may or may not be part of the estate. Assuming this was a joint checking account with your step-father, then the rule is generally that any funds in the joint account as of the date of death would belong to any survivors. So if there was a joint checking account between your mother and step-father, funds in the account would belong to your step-father.

There would be no reason for your step-brother to open a new joint account with your step-father if your step-brother was already power of attorney unless this was what they wanted as a way of doing "poor man's" estate planning since when your step-father died everything in the joint account with your step-brother would pass to the step-brother. The safe deposit box does not quite work that way - it would depend on what is in there and if your step-father had a will. Anything in the safe deposit box owned by your step-father as of the date of his death would pass as per his will, if any, or the state intestacy laws, if none.

Regarding the life insurance policy, any attorney would need to see how it is written. Usually an agent under a power of attorney cannot use the power of attorney to benefit himself by changing the beneficiary on a life insurance policy to the agent. I have it written into the financial powers that I draft that the agent cannot do this unless they are a spouse or child. So an attorney would need to see the power of attorney to see what it says. However, who was the original beneficiary? If it was your mother and she died, then I don't see this as a big deal.

You mention that your step-father died after your mother. Did your mother have a will and, if so, was there any kind of survivorship requirement? When I draft my wills I have a 90-day survivorship requirement. If there was none and if there is a will then anything your mother owned would pass to the survivors named in her will. If she left everything to your step-father then you are out of luck. If your mother did not have a will, then your mother's assets would pass under the state intestacy laws to your step-father, you and any other children of your mother. Your step-brother would not be included unless he was adopted by your mother.

So depending on how things play out you might be out of luck. You do not indicate where the estates for your mother and step-father would be or are probated nor do you indicate what probate assets they had. Caveat and other legal proceedings are very expensive. You need to see what you have and whether anything improper in fact occurred. However, as your step-father is deceased and as you are not a biological child of your step-father (unless he adopted you) I do not see why it makes any difference to you. Unless there was a will left by your step-father naming you as partial beneficiary and there are probate assets, you have no rights to inherit anything.

While it would be tempting to blame your step-brother here, the real problem is in the lack of proper estate planning by your mother and step-father. Again, you do not indicate what probate assets they owned or how they were titled but with proper planning they could have ensured that all would not be inherited by your step-father or the beneficiary changed on the life insurance policy.

I agree with Attorney McGill that you need to see a probate lawyer who practices in the state where your mother's and step-father's estates are or would be pending. You need to be prepared to pay the attorney to review the financial powers of attorney, wills and any other relevant documents (deeds, insurance policies etc.) to see what, if anything can be done.

If there was some misconduct that benefitted the stepbrother and deprived you of what you would have inherited, you would bring a separate legal action against the step-brother. Has the life insurance money been paid out yet? If so, then bring an immediate action against the step-brother and get a protective order prohibiting your step-brother from spending any of that money. Make him post a bond or pay the money into court. If the insurance company has not paid out the money, see if what is called an "interpleader" can be brought directing the insurance company to pay the money into court while you and your step-brother litigate who would be entitled to the money.