Despite the assertions of many estate lawyers, will forgery is not as rare as you might think. However, forensic document experts now have their high-profile example that this stuff really does happen: Brooke Astor's son and his lawyer. The son of Brooke Astor, the legendary New York society matriarch, was convicted on Thursday of stealing from her as she suffered from Alzheimer's disease in the twilight of her life. A second defendant in the case, Francis X. Morrissey Jr., a lawyer who did estate planning for Mrs. Astor, was convicted of forgery charges.
Charges associated with document forgery are more common than proven cases of it. Most of the time they are alleged by an adult child who feels short-changed by a parent's will. Typically, such individuals will accuse a sibling of falsifying the document.
The majority of forgery claims result a finding that the will had not been tampered with and that the signature on the will is legitimate.
However, when cases do occur they sometimes get the unwitting support of a will's witnesses who don't necessarily know that by placing their signatures on a document, they were supposed to have seen ink meet the paper by the testator.
There are several ways to look for signs of a forgery. Some of these include finding different varieties of ink on the will which may be an indication of improper alteration. Where a signature was stopped and started can also provide clues as to whether the signature is genuine.
For the most part, estate planning lawyers don't see this kind of activity on a regular basis. Nonetheless, it is certainly something of which to be aware.
Since the signing of the will requires one, if not several actual witnesses, the ability of a forger to actually pull off a successful alteration becomes very difficult. It would require multiple parties acting together.
The questions of whether a testator who signed was incompetent or unduly influenced, on the other hand, comes up frequently.
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