Legal Question in Criminal Law in Wisconsin

Yes, if the money was rightfully yours, you can sue her for it (whoever she is) if she wrongfully took it. However, being mentioned in someone's will never guarantees that you will get anything, since most people who have done even a small amount of basic estate planning often die with little or no assets in their estates. This is easily accomplished by placing real estate and financial accounts into some sort of joint ownership or making them payable to somebody upon death, such as by designating a beneficiary on life insurance and retirement accounts. If the decedent did that, the asset(s) then passes to the beneficiary outside of the estate, simply by the stroke of a pen, and checks will flow from the institution directly, and without probate court involvement. A will which does not mention such assets (together with making the owner's "estate" the beneficiary) therefore would not control them. If "she" was such a beneficiary, then she may have been completely within her rights to keep the money. Obviously, neither I nor any other lawyer has any way of telling if this is the case or not without investigating the situation completely, so you would be wise to involve a lawyer if you wish to get to the bottom of what happened and what you might be able to do about it.

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