Man Kills Friends Mother and Grandmother for Inheritance Benefits – up for parole more than 20 years later. When does probate become a criminal enterprise?

One of the three men convicted in a Tsawwassen double murder  more than two decades ago is up for parole again next week. Derik Lord, who is now in his early 40s, was one of three teens convicted in the slayings of his friend’s mother and grandmother in a murder-for-hire inheritance plot in October of 1990. Although they get their attention from the criminal court, these cases also effect Florida Probate. Learn the different ways a homicide (criminal, intention murder) can change a Florida Probate.

1. Lord was convicted of first-degree murder in 1992 and sentenced to life in prison without a chance for parole for 10 years in the deaths of Sharon Huenemann and Doris Leatherbarrow.
2. As a young offender at the time of his conviction – he was just 16 at the time of the murder — no parole for 10 years was the maximum sentence the judge could hand down.
3. Lord still denies the accusation and as a result has been denied parole since 2002 when he first became eligible (the board feels he cannot take accountability and that it would be unsafe to release him).
4. Darren Huenemann, the mastermind behind the murders of his mother and grandmother, and co-accused David Muir both admitted their roles in the double slaying.Huenemann, who was sentenced as an adult, received a life sentence and remains in prison while Muir served his 10-year sentence and was released a decade ago.

So the story of a wealthy family slain for the inheritance is not just a pulp fiction — so what happens next? Intentional murder affects probate. This is most commonly done through something called a slayer statute.

• A slayer statute stops a murder from benefiting from their criminal enterprise most commonly this occurs through life insurance fraud where a beneficiary will kill thepolicy holder for the money but wills can similarly be invalidated through a courts power of equity (fairness).
• Florida Courts have previously held under similar facts (read more in another blog post from this week!) that a slayer statute does not act as a complete forfeiture.
• This obviously leaves a lot of questions like where does that money go under a slayer statute?
• Florida’s slayer statute is found in F.S. 732.802

Do you think that foul play had something to do with a loved one’s demise.

1. This is first and foremost a criminal matter.
2. But it is also a probate matter and can affect the will and inheritance.