Rubin on Probate Litigation

U.S. Sugar Corp. v. Estate of Mullins , 211 So.3d 110 (Fla. 4th DCA 2017) This decision deals with an estate's attempt to seek discovery from a non-party to the probate action.  In this instance, the non-party is the entity which owns the location on which the decedent died.  The estate served a subpoena duces tecum upon the non-party seeking documents relating to its investigation of the fatal accident which killed the decedent.  The Court held as follows: (1) The discovery sought information not reasonably calculated to lead to the discovery of admissible evidence in the probate proceeding .  At the time of serving the discovery, the estate had not filed a wrongful death action.  Because the underlying probate petition was devoid of any allegations upon which to premise discovery upon the non-party, the Court agreed with the non-party that the subpoena was nothing more than a fishing expedition seeking information which might give rise to a potential ...

Inglis v. Casselberry , 200 So.3d 206 (Fla. 2d DCA 2016) And the Berlinger versus Casselberry saga continues.  As you may remember, we first met Bruce Berlinger and Roberta Casselberry back in 2013, when Roberta, the former spouse, obtained an order from the court affirming writs of garnishment on discretionary distributions to Bruce, the former husband, from four family trusts.   Roberta then filed supplemental proceedings against Bruce and trustees of several trusts of which Bruce and his children were beneficiaries.  She sought discovery against Bruce and the trustees, seeking information about distributions to Bruce and his adult children.  The trustees objected with regard to the distributions to the adult children, arguing that those distributions were not at issue, and that the children have a constitutional right to privacy with regard to their personal financial information.  The trial court overruled the objections, noting the litigation histo...