Why Texas DAs Rarely Prosecute Estate Theft, and Why Lawyers Like It That Way
Texas prosecutors rarely bring charges in connection with estate thefts, and probate lawyers are partly to blame.
The lawyers usually advise heirs to file civil lawsuits rather than go to police, the Austin American-Statesman reports. Civil lawyers are not required to report the suspected theft by clients’ relatives under state ethics rules, and they view civil suits as more likely to satisfy their clients’ goals, the story says.
Dallas probate lawyer David Pyke explains in an American-Statesman interview. Prosecutors “put the person you are suing in jail, which may be a good thing for society, but doesn’t get you any money,” he said. “They can’t make money in jail.”
Sometimes it is the lawyers who are accused. Austin lawyer Terry Erwin Stork pleaded guilty to felony theft charges on Friday for stealing from three estates, the Austin American-Statesman reports in a separate story published Saturday. Court records said he lived in the home of one deceased client, and in another case, he drove a client’s Buick LeSabre.
A letter from Bexar County Probate Judge Tom Rickhoff led to the investigation and prosecution of Stork. The newspaper describes Rickhoff as one of the most aggressive probate judges in suspected estate theft cases. He says he has forwarded dozens of possible cases to prosecutors.
“The culture here was that all the civil lawyers thought every dispute about where money went is a civil matter that should be resolved in a lawsuit,” Rickhoff told the American-Statesman. “It was clear to me that if you take a diamond ring and give it to someone [else], you stole the diamond ring.”
The American-Statesman wrote about the Stork case in more detail in a story published Friday, the same day he entered a guilty plea.
