How To Prove Breach Of Duty By A Trustee
Trusts are important legal documents that can protect your assets from the probate process and allow your beneficiaries to receive their inheritance more quickly. When you establish a trust, you are known as the grantor and will likely manage the trust during your lifetime. You will also appoint a successor trustee, who will take over trust management after you pass away.
Trustees have a fiduciary duty to ensure the wishes of the decedent are respected and upheld. When trustees fail to do this, it has a very negative impact on beneficiaries. If you believe you have a breach of fiduciary duty claim against a trustee, you will have to prove many elements of your case. Below, our Daytona Beach wills and trusts lawyer explains what these are.
A Fiduciary Relationship Existed
A fiduciary is an individual who holds an ethical or legal relationship of trust with one or more people. In most cases, a fiduciary handles money or other property for another party. When proving breach of duty, you must first show that a fiduciary relationship existed. Fortunately, this is fairly straightforward, as the trust established by the grantor can prove the fiduciary duties and responsibilities of the trustee.
Breach of Fiduciary Duty
After proving that a fiduciary duty existed, you must show that the trustee breached their duty. Essentially, this means showing that the trustee did not act in the best interests of the grantor. This requires you to present strong evidence that the fiduciary violated the terms of the trust. For example, if certain property was left to a beneficiary in a trust, a significant amount of time has passed since the death, and the beneficiary still has not received the property, that may be a violation of the trust’s terms.
Damages Were Incurred
In order to file a claim against a trustee, you must have sustained actual damages. The purpose of these claims is to compensate beneficiaries, or help them to correct a situation. Staying with the above example, a judge may order a trustee to turn over the property immediately, and may also order them to pay damages for any loss sustained due to the delay. In any case, if you did not suffer losses, there is no claim for damages.
A Direct Link
Lastly, you must also prove the direct link between your losses and the actions of the trustee. For example, a trustee may be responsible for selling the deceased’s home after they pass away. You may file a breach of duty claim against them for selling the home at a much lower price than what you had agreed to. If the trustee argues that there were few buyers and they sold it for the highest possible price, a judge may decide in their favor because they were still acting in the best interests of the grantor and the beneficiaries.
Our Wills and Trusts Lawyer in Daytona Beach Can Prove Your Case
At Bundza & Rodriguez, our Daytona Beach wills and trusts lawyer can review the facts of your case, determine a breach of duty existed, and help you prove it so you obtain the full damages you deserve. Call us today at 386-252-5170 or contact us online to request a consultation and to learn more about how we can help.
Source:
leg.state.fl.us/statutes/index.cfm?App_mode=Display_Statute&URL=0700-0799/0736/0736.html
