But all of that may have finally reached a conclusion as a Tennessee appeals court has ruled against Mary Reeves' second husband, Terry Davis. When Mary died in 1999, her will left him $100,000, and the bulk of the rest of her estate to her family (the Whites) and Jim's. This was contrary to the singer's own wishes, by the way.
Under Tennessee law, a surviving spouse can sometimes claim more of an inheritance than the deceased intended, based on the number of years of marriage. In this case, Mary and Terry were married for 30 years. In some states, if the deceased's will does not leave a sufficient amount, the surviving spouse may "elect against the will." That means they are entitled to a minimum share of the estate — an amount that can vary from state to state.
It was the contention of Terry Davis' legal representatives that he was entitled to a 40% share of Mary's estate.
The attorney for the heirs argued against this however, claiming that "they believe strongly it was Mary's dream to preserve and promote the legacy of Jim Reeves, and the reason they have engaged in this litigation is to try and realize that dream for her. That's why they've worked so hard to try and get the copyrights and royalty rights and Jim's intellectual property back into Mary's estate."
This assertion of altruistic motives is a bit hard to swallow, given the fact that most of the heirs have taken no active interest in Jim's career such that when I've spoken with a lot of them, they have not displayed even the most elementary knowledge of his recorded legacy. Nor did any of them, that I am aware of, spend any of their own money (like some fans have done) trying to rescue irreplaceable recordings or personal artifacts of Jim's. Nor has there been any evidence so far that they are prepared to do anything constructive to promote Jim's legacy, such as establish a scholarship in his name for worthy music students, as he desired to do in his own will.
Over 12 years of litigation, Terry Davis hired and fired at least six sets of attorneys, with the final firing taking place just days before the long-delayed trial had been set to commence last year. The judge in the case, Randy Kennedy, allowed Terry to discharge his lawyers, but refused to continue the trial any longer for him to secure new counsel. That was a very strange decision, IMHO.
So Terry — who is not a lawyer — had to represent himself at the 2012 trial. After losing in the probate court, he filed an appeal with the Tennessee Court of Appeals.
Meanwhile, the Associated Press ran a story that circulated worldwide that Mary was going to be moved from the mausoleum where she is interred in Madison, Tenn., to the Jim Reeves Memorial gravesite in Carthage, Texas. The source for this premature story is well known and got into some hot water over it within family councils. But it's not the first time she's been outspoken.
In its new decision, the Appeals court rendered its verdict on a very narrow legal question: could Terry Davis elect against his wife's will when he had already accepted the $100,000 she had bequeathed him? The court's answer was: NO. Under a technicality of Tennessee law, in order to elect against the will, Terry should have refused any specific bequest in order to elect the statutory minimum to which he would have been entitled.
The Appeals Court also decided that Terry had no right to be represented by a lawyer at the trial, so the judge's refusal to grant him a continuance was not a legal error.
It should be pointed out that there was testimony (and the probate court found), that just before her death in 1999, Terry Davis had transferred more than $250,000 out of her accounts. That didn't exactly help his claim of entitlement to maintenance from her estate under Tennessee law.
Terry Davis was quoted in the press last year as stating "This is not about Jim Reeves' estate. It's about Mary's estate. These people are not even blood relatives of Mary, and they should have a share over someone (who was) married to her for 30 years?"
The fact that the Reeves estate was tied up in the courts for so many years meant that the heirs have not yet been paid. This includes former Blue Boy Bud Logan, who became romantically involved with Mary soon after (some alleged BEFORE) Jim died, and to whom she left $100,000 — the same amount she bequeathed her husband Terry.
Jim's own will made it clear that he did not intend for his siblings to inherit his estate (he left the bulk of it to his wife and his mother), but Mary disregarded his wishes when she made her wills. (She had more than one over the years).
This means that since all of Jim's immediate family are deceased, the nieces and nephews will share in the spoils, as will the Whites.
I have befriended members of both families, and like some of them. But I have also gained insight into the duplicitous and greedy nature of others of them. This comes from their own lips; I have literally HOURS AND HOURS of taped conversations with them in which they dish the dirt on each other, plot and scheme against one another, etc. That alone would make for a spectacular PR disaster for them if it were ever revealed.
Each of these individuals has an equal share of the estate — no one more (or less) than the other. No one individual speaks for the estate. It would appear that with the resolution of this legal battle, the role of attorney Ames Davis (no relation to Terry) — who has served as the administrator for about 12 years of Mary's estate — may be coming to a close. In one five-year period, attorney and administrator fees for Mary's estate have ranged from $40,000 to $285,000 per year.
A couple of years ago, Jim's catalog was appraised at $1.2 million. It could be sold and the proceeds divided. Or the heirs could agree to have the catalog managed and divide the ongoing payments. I would bet the latter occurs, and who knows? Maybe Ames will continue to manage affairs of the estate.
I hope this update clarifies things for Jim Reeves' fans around the world, and especially for Anita Wadhwani of the Nashville Tennessean newspaper, who last year solicited a copy of my book which she asked me to overnight at my expense, gleaned information from it as well as background I supplied, and then reneged on her promise to give appropriate attribution for the information she used in a series of articles she wrote for the Nashville paper that were picked up by the wire services and circulated around the world. (Unfortunately, these stories misleadingly stated that Mary left her estate to A niece and A nephew, both of whom were cited by name even though this was inaccurate).
So far the Tennessean hasn't run any articles on this latest court decision, but anything I can do to help Ms. Wadhwani with her research I am certainly eager to do, knowing as I do what a fair-minded and conscientious reporter she is.
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