|
 Millions At Stake In Gay Adult Adoption Case
by 365Gay.com Newscenter Staff
Posted: January 15, 2007 - 2:00 pm ET
(Portland, Maine) A Maine law that permits
adult adoption is at the center of a legal dispute in two states and involves
millions of dollars.
In 1991 Olive F. Watson used the law to adopt her
partner of 14 years, Patricia A. Spado. Even though the couple lived in
Connecticut Watson owned a summer home in Maine.
Watson was the daughter of former IBM executive Thomas J.
Watson Jr., who was the CEO of the company from 1956 to 1971 and built it from a
small cash register maker to a computer giant.
Now Watson, Spado and the Watson estate are
battling in court over whether Spado is entitled to a share of the late Thomas
Watson's estate.
When Watson adopted Spado there were no same-sex
partnership agreements in the country and Watson believed it would provide Spado
with security if anything happened to her.
But a year later the couple broke up.
When Thomas Watson's widow died in 2004 his
fortune went into a trust and her 18 grandchildren became eligible to receive income from two
trusts until they turned 35, at which time they would receive the principal
outright.
Several months later a lawyer representing Spado notified the trust that
there was a 19th grandchild, Spado, and that she also was entitled to a
share of the trust.
A probate court in Connecticut where the will was
filed ruled that Spado was not a grandchild and not entitled to any month. The
decision is now on appeal in the state's superior court.
Meanwhile, the trustees of the estate went to
court in Maine to have the adoption overturned. Ruling on a technicality a
court said that Spado and Watson were not legally residents of Maine when the
adoption was granted.
Spado appealed to the Maine Supreme Judicial Court,
and late last week it overturned the ruling and sent the
case back to lower court. The case will be heard next month.
In papers filed with the court, the Watson family
attorney argues that if a ruling is favorable to Spado it could have "far-reaching and national
implications."
"It would mean that parties from anywhere in the country could come to
Maine and adopt their sexual partner to manufacture inheritance rights for that
person, even if neither party was a Maine resident and their state of residency
would not have permitted the adoption," the court filing argues.
©365Gay.com 2007
|
Entertainment
