Legal News

Astor Trial to Examine Brooke Astor?s Mental Condition

By Ashby Jones

Even for folks far removed from New York’s upper-crust society, the criminal trial of Brooke Astor’s son and lawyer promises to bring its share of intriguing moments, what with its allegations of greed, cruelty and filial deceit.

The trial, which begins Monday in State Supreme Court in Manhattan, spotlights the acts of Brooke Astor’s son, Anthony Marshall, and Astor’s lawyer, Francis Morrissey, while Astor fell into the grip of Alzheimer’s disease late in life. Astor died in 2007 at age 105.

Marshall and Morrissey have been accused of exploiting Astor’s ailments to trick her into directing millions of dollars their way. Much of the trial will likely focus on a change to Astor’s will that took place in early 2004. The change gave Marshall Astor’s estate outright.

According to this curtain-raiser in Monday’s New York Times, the trial could hinge on the following question: What was Astor’s mental state in the final years of her life? Click here, here and here for earlier LB coverage on the Astor situation.

In trying to prove their case, prosecutors will rely heavily on a letter Marshall wrote to one of her doctors in 2000. In the letter, Marshall wrote that his mother had difficulty getting dressed, writing and spelling.

That said, according to the Times story, the mere fact that someone has a degenerative mental condition does not prevent that person from consenting to a change in a will, lawyers and legal scholars say. Alzheimer's patients can have moments of lucidity, and so prosecutors must prove that Astor was mentally incapacitated at the moment she approved amendments.

Both men face charges of conspiracy and scheming to defraud. Mr. Marshall, 84, also faces a charge of first-degree grand larceny, the most serious count on the indictment, for selling one of his mother's Childe Hassam paintings for $10 million and pocketing $2 million as commission. If convicted of the top count, he could face up to 25 years in prison. Both men have maintained their innocence.

Full post as published by Law Blog - WSJ.com on March 30, 2009 (boomark / email).