Legal Question in Family Law in Virginia
Father's wife left us nothing
My father was married three times, and had children with his first two wives(3 blood+1 adopted). I am a child of his second wife. After he got married the third time his wife kicked him out. He was living on his own and during that time he had an aneurism which left the entire left side of his body unusable. He later had another one and died from it. His current wife, though he was not living with him took everything he had. There was $10,000, all of his patents on plants that he had created, (he was a gardener), and all of his personal belongings that she promised us. She left with the money and moved to Georgia. My question is is there anything I can do/could have done? This was 11 years ago and I just found out that it may not have been helpless to try. My father did not have any will, he was planning on making one before he died though. Would it be possible to do anything? I know it's very late, but can anything be done now, or could anything have been done if I or my family had reacted sooner? Thank you for your help.
Sincerely,
--name removed--Thompson
1 Answer from Attorneys
Re: Father's wife left us nothing
Under Virginia's law of intestate succession(no will), the third wife would've been legally entitled to no more than one third of her deceased husband's estate and his children(both biological and adopted)should've then divided the remainder.
As to what could've been done some 11 years ago, the third wife's apparent seizure of all of the estate property certainly could've been challenged by any of the other potential beneficiaries. However, since no one apparently felt strongly enough about the matter at that time to come forward to contest it, I would have to surmise that it's now very likely way too late to now take the matter up in a state that's a good way off from Virginia.
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