Thursday,
March 21, 2002
REGISTER
OF PROBATE IANNELLA SEEKS MISSING HEIRS; THOUSANDS AVAILABLE
TO THOSE UNKNOWINGLY LEFT MONEY IN WILLS AND ESTATES:
Suffolk
County Register of Probate Richard Iannella is actively
looking for missing heirs to money currently held at the
Registry. The funds are held in ‘custodial accounts,’ and
ended up in the jurisdiction of the Registry because of legal
action that took place at one time or another in Suffolk
County Probate and Family Court. Those actions include the
probating of a will, holding of money in escrow because of a
divorce or other dispute, and depositing of funds left to a
minor who can receive the money once they come of age.
“In
many of these cases, inheritances were left for children to
receive when they were older, but word never got to these
people that the money was theirs once they came of age,”
said Register Iannella. “Other cases involve those who left
money to relatives, descendants or friends when they died, but
the executors of the will couldn’t find these heirs when it
came time to settle the estate. In a few cases, even the
intended heir had also passed away. In order to ‘close
out’ the will and complete their responsibilities, the
executors left the money with us. We are now responsible to
maintain the account and find any potential heirs.”
Since
beginning to actively search for these ‘missing heirs,’
Register Iannella has distributed more than $50,000 to those
who made legitimate claims following confirmation by Registry
officials. More than $700,000 in all is awaiting distribution
to rightful heirs. “In one instance, $3,000 left to each of
three grandchildren three decades ago has more than
quadrupled, and each heir is now due nearly $13,000,” said
Iannella. “In another, several members of one family have
nearly $20,000 coming to each of them. Very few of these cases
involve small dollar amounts. In fact, there are thousands of
dollars due to many of the individuals that we are looking
for.”
WHDH-TV
Consumer Affairs reporter Hank Phillippi Ryan featured
Iannella’s efforts to find the missing heirs during last
night’s 11:00PM newscast in a special segment entitled
‘Will Power.’ In the minutes following the story, those
looking for information about the missing heirs inundated
Iannella’s Web site. “By noon today, well over 5,000 hits
were recorded on the Web page listing missing heirs, and
several callers to our office this morning appear to have
money coming to them. Usually, government is looking to
collect, but this is one case where we’re looking to give
out, and for these people, it’s like hitting the lottery,”
he said.
Information
about these accounts and the missing heirs currently being
sought is available at Register Iannella’s Internet Web
site. The address is www.probatecourtiannella.com.
(Because the Trial Court does not fund the development and
posting of Web sites for individual divisions, the new site is
maintained at private expense, and is an unofficial Internet
site for the Registry.)
To
link to the list of missing heirs, click here.
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