I wondered that the first time I saw the
expression. I stumbled across it while researching the probate exception for a
brief I was writing to the federal Fifth Circuit. I saw it in Professor Peter
Nicholas treatise titled: “FIGHTING THE PROBATE MAFIA: A DISSECTION OF THE
PROBATE EXCEPTION TO FEDERAL COURT JURISDICTION“. The good professor
does not define the expression in his treatise and in fact, the words “probate
mafia” only appear in the title. The expression does not appear in the text of
the treatise itself.
What is a Mafia?
According to wikipedia: “Mafia” is an informal term that is used to
describe criminal organizations that bear a strong similarity to the Sicilian
Mafia. The central activity of such an organization would be the
arbitration of disputes between criminals as well as the organization and
enforcement of illicit agreements between criminals through the use of or
threat of violence. Mafias often engage in secondary activities such as
gambling, loan sharking, drug-trafficking, prostitution, and fraud.
What is Probate?
Probate is an action in rem. In actions in rem “the
thing” itself is impugned as the defendant and all
claims are against the thing.
People die and by virtue of that act they abandon all of their worldly
possessions. If the decedent’s property is of any significance,
or a dispute over its disposition, transfer of title to the property must
usually be settled formally. Thus, when someone dies, their property forms an
abstraction called an estate (estate of John/Jane Doe). This abstraction is a
container object created by operation of law to hold all of the decedents stuff
while rights to the “property” are determined. These rights are usually
determined by specialty courts that have been established for that purpose. I
will will not bother with distinctions between
district or superior courts sitting in probate or county courts at law or
statutory probate courts as none of that adds anything
but confusion. This, none-the-less, leads us back to the initial question with
a couple of the blanks filled in: What is the probate mafia?
In my experience the probate mafia is a criminal enterprise conducted by
attorneys, judges and other licensed professionals, using the state probate
courts for the purpose of intercepting (stealing) family generational asset
transfers, sometimes referred to as inheritance hijacking by thieves with
PhDs.
First of all let’s talk about certainty. If one is not busy being born, one
is busy dying. That is a certainty. The uncertainty is in when and how one will
pass. Another uncertainty is “what will happen to your stuff when you die?”
The “Grift of the Brunstings” is a case study that stands for the
proposition that it doesn’t matter what plans you make, what you intend to go
to your heirs will end up in the pockets of attorneys and other probate mafia
participants. I’m going to provide a link to a vital piece in the puzzle because an integral part of
the manner in which the color-of-law mafia operates so successfully is juridically manufactured immunity. In other words, they
have declared themselves above the law under the pretext of agency.
I am only reporting an observation based upon a narrow experience but I have
noticed that others have made similar observations and come to similar
conclusions. Stop Probate Fraud
recently caught my eye and then there is the National Association to
Stop Guardianship Abuse, which I think is a well
intentioned web site addressing the source of one revenue stream run
under the antecedent label of “guardianship protection”. There are other sites
and the number of sites addressing this general subject appears to reflect a
growing awareness. It used to be that you could hide your dirty laundry in
court records that could only accessed by going to the court house. Those days
are over and unlike private sector criminal conspirators,
the probate mob keeps books and records that are available to the public. Why? Because they claim to be conducting the peoples
business.
The manufacture of
a Frankensuit
I purchased this URL because I am a witness to the most egregious and
obscene conduct perpetrated under the color of law that I have ever observed,
even in the most seedy environments, and I intend to
tell the story that inspired this web site. While Guardianship, one of the main
avenues to stealing generational assets, rears its ugly head in this scenario
despite specific assurances from the estate planning attorneys [1], [2], [3] the effort failed because the family doctor was honest.
Thus, in my initial dissertation we will only deal with the probate mob’s
scheme to steal a family trust. This is a story I call Grift of the
Brunsting’s!
This web site is
under development and hopefully it will become a place where others can tell
their stories.
What is different is, unlike wringing hands web sites that complain about
the problem, talk about the victims and mutter about legislation, I intend to
name names so that everyone will know who the predators are and how they
operate.
Legislation is worthless when the courts only use it to evade honesty and accountability.You don’t need my
opinion when the facts speak for themselves. So, lets get to the Grift of the Brunsting’s!