Who gets items from Robin Williams estate? Court has to decide between his widow and his children
There’s no dispute about the colorful suspenders Robin Williams famously wore on his Mork & Mindy television series more than 30 years ago. They belong to his children.
But other items of memorabilia are at the center of a contentious legal battle between his widow, Susan Schneider Williams, and his three children from two previous marriages, according to the Associated Press and NBC Bay Area. A court hearing is scheduled Monday in the Marin County matter.
An earlier New York Times (reg. req.) article details the specifics of the late actor’s estate plan, which provided for his wife to get their Tiburon, California, home and its contents and have its expenses paid for her lifetime through a trust. The children are the beneficiaries of another trust, and inherit Williams’ memorabilia, awards and other relics of a star-studded career that ended last year when he committed suicide at age 63.
The problem is the overlap between what is in his widow’s home and what could be considered memorabilia. Susan Williams says she should get her husband’s wedding tuxedo and other “knickknacks,” the Times reports. The three children, who range in age from mid-twenties to early thirties, take issue with that description of their father’s collections of action figures, theater masks, graphic novels and movie posters, among other items they describe as having sparked his creativity.
In the process of staking their respective claims, each side has also criticized the other.
“Mr. Williams wanted his wife to be able to stay in her home and not be disrupted in her life with her children,” the widow’s attorney, Jim Wagstaffe, told the Times, which notes that Susan Williams has two teenagers of her own. “Compared to what the Williams children were set to receive from their father, this is a bucket of water in a lake,” Wagstaffe said.
Williams’ three children portray Susan Williams as seeking to profit from a marriage that took place only in 2011. Arguing for money for living expenses before her trust was even funded illustrates “the greed that appears to be driving petitioner’s actions,” a court filing says.
