Black Widow left estate to a disabled friend
CATHERINE Nevin left most of her worldly goods to a mystery beneficiary ‘with a significant disability,’ the Supreme Court has heard.
And before her death, the ‘Black Widow’ – who was convicted in 2000 of organising the 1996 murder of her husband Tom Nevin – put two executors in charge of her will who may now continue to fight her late husband’s family for his entire €1million fortune, it has been revealed.
The convicted killer was 67 when she died of an brain tumour in February still protesting her innocence. She had been fighting a civil suit taken against her by Tom Nevin’s family, who wanted to stop her inheriting her late husband’s entire €1million-plus estate.
Defending the case, Nevin insisted that just because she was convicted of murder by a jury, this was not ‘conclusive’ proof of her guilt. Although the High Court and Court of Appeal disagreed with her, she was granted permission for a Supreme Court appeal less than a year before her death.
Regardless of her crime or any final court decision on the civil action against her, Nevin was still in line to recover 50% of her late husband’s estate – arising from a previous High Court judgment granting wife-killer Eamonn Lillis access to half of his late wife Celine Cawley’s estate.
Before she died, Nevin’s Supreme Court appeal had been scheduled for a pre-trial hearing yesterday, and lawyers for both sides discussed what should happen next.
Colman Fitzgerald SC, for Nevin, told Chief Justice Frank Clarke that it ‘may be a matter’ where the two executors will seek to be ‘added’ to his client’s Supreme Court appeal in order to pursue the case that was being made by Nevin before her death.
Mr Fitzgerald revealed that the ‘main beneficiary’ of the will is ‘someone with a significant disability’, but did not name the individual. He added that ‘notice should be given’ to that beneficiary if the two executors decide to apply to be joined to the appeal.
Chief Justice Clarke, the country’s most senior judge, said the two executors appointed by Catherine Nevin should get ‘the first chance to make that call’.
Adjourning the case until next month to see what the executors want to do next, the judge stressed: ‘It’s in everyone’s interest if this is disposed of in a reasonable time frame.’
The inheritance dispute began two decades ago when Mr Nevin’s brother and sister, Patrick Nevin and Margaret Lavelle, first took legal action to stop her getting any of her late husband’s fortune.
They argued that Nevin should not be able to profit from her crime – but Nevin fought them all the way. Their civil action centres on the 1965 Succession Act, which states that ‘the perpetrator of the crime of murder should not be the beneficiary of it.’
Tom Nevin’s estate includes Jack White’s pub – sold in late 1997 for the equivalent of €787,000 – and two properties in Dublin 8. The publican also had a policy with Irish Life worth almost €100,000 and about €250,000 in savings. paul.caffrey@dailymail.ie