Court lists continue to be populated with long running family disputes

The fictional perennial case of Jarndyce v Jarndyce, central to Bleak House by Charles Dickens, is familiar to many. However, over 160 years later long running family disputes are still routinely brought to court.

In a recent example, a case involved Andrew Frejek and his brother, Stephen, and sister, Susan. These were the three children of Brenda Frejek who passed away on 10 April 2009. Brenda left a will appointing Stephen as her executor, however by the middle of 2017, Stephen failed to progress the administration of the estate. As a result, Andrew made an application to remove Stephen as the executor, seeking an order for him to be appointed in Stephen’s place. Although Andrew’s application was successful, this was not the end of the litigation as Stephen did not comply with the necessary obligations included. Following over a decade of proceedings and Stephen’s failure to comply with mandatory orders which meant that he was held in contempt of court, Stephen was brought before the court for sentencing.

John Darnton, Consultant in BDB Pitmans’ family and matrimonial team, discusses the case in his article for Today’s Wills & Probate.

The full article is available here.