All good mysteries are wrapped up in an enigma. Take Deputy Master Linwood’s opening to a judgment last week: ‘This is an unusual probate claim in that the deceased says she is very much alive.’
The case concerned the estate of June Ashimola, valued at £172,000. Bakare Olatoye Lasisi, who claims to have married Ashimola in 1993, and Ruth Samuel, who holds a power of attorney over Lasisi, say Ashimola died intestate in Nigeria in 2019.
The judgment noted that the case included ‘wide-ranging allegations of fraud, forgery, impersonation and intimidation’. The judge observed that the conduct of the trial was ‘substantially beyond the norm’.
But the denouement comes in paragraph 144. ‘I find Ms Ashimola is alive and that the death certificate was forged and/or fraudulently obtained or produced or concocted.’
The judge found that the person who appeared before him, remotely, and identified herself as Ashimola was ‘physically like her photographs in each passport’. The death certificate ‘was not proven to the necessary standard in that only a copy was produced’.
The judge revoked the grant of probate on the ground that Ashimola is alive. And if the judge turns out to be wrong, the grant was revoked due to the actions of the claimants. ‘Revocation on either basis is by s.25(1) and/or s.121 of the [Senior Courts] Act and/or the inherent jurisdiction of the court.’
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