Thursday, February 11, 2010

27 Years in Litigation

A family feud over a father's will that has raged for more than a quarter-century - pitting two sisters against their brother in a Bronx court - may finally be over.

Diana Sakow and Evelyn Breslaw were naive young women when their father, real estate investor Max Sakow, died of a heart attack in 1956.

Now retired golden-agers, the sisters have been awarded part of their father's holdings, capping one of the longest-running probate battles in the city.

"My father wanted us to have this when we were young," said Breslaw, 69, who was 15 when her father died. "He didn't want us to have to go to court for it."

The fight began in 1983, when the sisters claim they discovered that their older brother, Walter Sakow, had hidden their father's one-page, handwritten will.

"I was told when my father died that we were impoverished," said Diana Sakow, now a retired high school teacher living in New Rochelle.

In fact, the will left a third of their dad's estate - which the sisters say totaled more than 100 properties - to his wife, with the remainder split equally among the kids.

Walter Sakow, with the support of their mother, told the sisters the family was deeply in debt and the properties had to be sold off, they claimed.

A law school grad who never joined the bar, the brother secretly used his father's properties to build up a real estate business for himself, they charged.

There was no bad blood until 1983, when the curious sisters discovered the will in a Bronx courthouse. They confronted their mother at the family's home in Morris Park. When she denied knowing about a will, they drove to the brother's home on Long Island, where he called the cops on them.

They've been in court ever since.

The sisters say they're heartbroken by the family betrayal and frustrated by the slow grinding of the wheels of justice.

"There's no end," Diana Sakow said. "He will litigate until everyone is dead, because the system allows it."

Full Article and Source:
Family Feud Lasts 27 Years in Court

11 comments:

  1. It's most definately a broken system. At times an elder persons life is actually taken from them intentionally by the injustice of the broken system. They are held captive and drugged while a court battle is repeatedly & intentionally delayed.

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  2. And, who are the financial winners in this OUTRAGEOUS 27 years of litigation over the estate of Max Sakow?

    L A W Y E R S and their pals

    I know of many cases where 100% of the estate went pooooof, directly into the L A W Y E R S pockets and the litigants were still at square one.

    The probate guardianship and estate court system is broken, everyone knows it, but hey what the heck L A W Y E R S like broken systems = $$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$ for them all of this by: design folks.

    So, I say if you have money do something great or stupid with it before you die:
    1)spend it 2) give it away 3) burn it!

    Or, option 4) would be to have your horror story here at NASGA blog spot.

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  3. A record, indeed, a la Bleak House!

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  4. The New York Surrogate Courts are a cesspool full of corrupt lawyers along with their pals (including the Judges) who allegedly "work" for the Court System. What a joke! They not only STEAL the Estate Monies, they also STEAL years from people lives that can't be replaced! These criminals all belong in JAIL!

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  5. IS THIS WHAT THEY MEAN BY HELL ON EARTH?

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  6. The photo of Diana Sakow and Evelyn Breslaw breaks my heart. Their faces wrenched with anguish speaks volumes and should serve as a warning to others who think they will succeed in the hellhole of litigation.

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  7. In a recent court filing of my own I requested the Court to take "Judicial Notice" of the readily discernible fact that while death may be final --- estate litigation goes on for years and years, and years, and years -----

    Thought I should let my adversaries know .....

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  8. This would seem unbelieveable, if it weren't so true. It is happening all over America, the land of the free. This corrupt system has taken over all of us.
    The system gets by with it because there is no accountability to an unbiased agency. They line one another's pockets while stating "it is in the interest of the ward". While all the time, it is in THEIR interest to take what does not belong to them, the ward's money. "Isolate, medicate, steal the estate!" That's what it's all about!

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  9. I feel so sorry for the Sakow family. This is disgusting and every lawyer involved should hang his/her collective head in shame.

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  10. The judge(s) who allowed this and all the lawyers as well, should be sanctioned.

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  11. Betty wrote: This is disgusting and every lawyer involved should hang his/her collective head in shame.

    Betty the problem is this will never happen lawyers and the word shame in the same sentence????

    Having feelings of shame would imply that the subject would be capable of having feelings or the very least moments with a conscience.

    In reality, this is NEVER going to happen, people first need to see and then believe that the system is RIGGED in their favor to drain the estate and all your money.

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