Legal Question in Wills and Trusts in Ohio

If the will is probated you will be notified and either receive a copy of the will or may request a copy from the probate.

I am sorry to hear that you lost your mom.

As attorney Schmitz has stated above, you should received a Notice of the Will having been admitted to Probate Court; typically, the Notice is sent via certified mail, with return receipt requested. Persons entitled to this Notice are those named as beneficiaries in a the Will, AND persons considered next-of-kin according to Ohio Revised Code 2105.06. Thus, even if you are not named in the Will as a beneficiary, you should receive Notice because you are a child of the decedent.

If the Will is being intentionally withheld by your sisters, or anyone else for that matter, there is a procedure where you can force the person suspected of withholding the Will to appear in Court and produce the Will or an explanation as to why it cannot be produced. This is a special proceeding called a Petition for a Citation to Produce a Will, and you will very likely need an attorney familiar with the process to do that for you.

Also, if the Will was revised shortly before your mom's death, it raises the possibility that the revision was a direct result of undue influence; this is not always the case, and it is not always easy to prove, but it is something that you may want to have reviewed with an experienced estate planning or probate attorney. If there was undue influence, or if you mom lacked capacity to sign a new will, you could file a Will Contest action to attempt to have that Will set aside and have the prior will admitted.

Many of these options are subject to specific time constraints, so you should have your situation reviewed in detail by an experienced probate lawyer.