Cases

Reporter Gary Shapiro’s article in The New York Sun describes our search for the background and family of this Manhattan “boulevardier” who invented himself. Click here to read the New York Sun article.

We care about the successful outcome of all of our cases, but this one added an extra tug to the heartstrings.

Finding the descendants of Mary and Elizabeth O’Connell for this kinship proceeding, in the attempt to distribute their cousin’s estate to family, proved to be especially challenging. We knew Mary and Elizabeth were daughters of Daniel O’Connell and Elizabeth McCarthy of Goshen, New York, and that the daughters were born in 1909 and 1910, respectively.

We discovered that, by 1920, the siblings had been separated. They were placed in different orphanages. With more research, we located records for their marriages and the births of their children. First cousins, who never heard of each other, not only inherited thousand of dollars, but also discovered their heritage.

When Laura Gross died testate in 2022, nothing was known about her except her birth date in 1932, birthplace of Austria (exact location unknown), and the name of her late husband. Her maiden name and her parents’ names were unknown. She had had no children. The friend who was to inherit her estate said that Ms. Gross refused to speak about her past. There was, we discovered, a compellling reason for that.

The typical reason due diligence research is required to settle an estate matter in New York, even when someone dies testate (with a Last Will and Testament), is that the person had no living spouse or children. Our challenge here was to find exactly where Ms. Gross was born, her maiden name, the names of her parents, including mother’s maiden name, and determine the whereabouts of any paternal and maternal aunts, uncles, first cousins, and, possibly, first cousins once-removed. It was also possible that she had had siblings.

We discovered that she was born in Vienna, the only child of Paul Stern and Amanda Brethower, also born in Vienna. Research in Austria, Holocaust, and other records revealed that both parents had siblings, all now deceased. One of the siblings had had issue.

Ms. Gross was a Holocaust survivor. Her parents and all but one of her paternal and maternal aunts and uncles were not.

We found living first cousins in Tel Aviv.

The lawyer wanted to know if the person claiming the house in Brooklyn was the rightful daughter of Eugenia Hughes, an elderly woman who had died intestate in 2008. The younger woman, stating her kinship rights, had moved into the little brownstone right after Eugenia Hughes’ death.

Our research showed that the “daughter” had been previously incarcerated for larceny, and that she had no blood ties with Ms. Hughes. She knew Ms. Hughes from the neighborhood, had assisted her with errands, and, gaining entry to the older woman’s home, had evidently learned enough about her to stake the fraudulent claim.

We work fast. But, for whatever reason, this case felt like it had to be solved immediately. On the face of things, it wasn't an urgent matter: a woman looking for the family of her father who died a month before she was born, 55 years earlier. She had never known anyone on her paternal side. Had her father had siblings? Had they had children?

We followed the family's trail from Queens to Boston to Detroit to Richmond, then to Milami. We discovered that our client's father had had one sibling, a sister, now deceased. The sister had had a son. He was living.

We located our client's first cousin Manuel. To the delight of both (and to us), we introduced them to each other.

The email from our client arrived a month later:

"I wanted to let you know that Manuel passed away on Friday. I spoke with him again on the evening before his operation. He went into surgery and never regained consciousness."

"I'm so grateful for the time I had with him. I can't help but ponder about the timing... If it had not been for you, I would not have found him in time."