Murder conviction can be used in case over Nevin’s will
Court ruling a setback for Black Widow’s estate
CATHERINE Nevin’s conviction for the murder of her husband cannot be ignored in relation to a bid she initiated before her death to claim her late husband’s entire €1.1million fortune, the Supreme Court has ruled.
The convicted killer put an executor in charge of her will before her death to pursue the inheritance that she fought for 21 years to collect.
Yesterday, the country’s highest court rejected her executor’s argument by a unanimous fivejudge decision.
Dubbed the ‘Black Widow’, Nevin was found guilty in 2000 of organising the 1996 murder of her husband Tom Nevin.
She was 67 when she died of an inoperable brain tumour a year ago, still insisting on her innocence. She was still serving a life sentence.
Nevin wanted the courts to rule that her Central Criminal Court conviction beyond a reasonable doubt was merely ‘the opinion of a jury’ and was never ‘conclusive’ proof of her guilt.
The former teacher asked the courts to put aside the ‘natural existing prejudice towards people who are convicted’ of committing crimes.
Crucially, the killer insisted that her conviction could never affect her inheritance rights.
Judge Iseult O’Malley, with the backing of her four colleagues on the Supreme Court, said the certificate of conviction is a public document and to disregard it could lead to ‘irrational and unjust results’.
The senior judges ruled that Nevin’s estate must now ‘accept the consequences’ of having fought that point all the way to the Supreme Court – and bear the cost of the resulting legal bill.
It’s not clear who would benefit if Nevin’s representatives were ultimately to win access to Tom Nevin’s whole estate.
However, as revealed by the Irish Daily Mail last March, the Supreme Court was told that the main beneficiary of her will is an individual ‘with a significant
Must bear cost of appeal
disability’ who has not been named in court.
Tom Nevin was shot dead at Jack White’s Inn pub in Brittas Bay, Co. Wicklow, that he owned with his wife.
Mr Nevin’s brother and sister, Patrick Nevin and Margaret Lavelle, first took legal action against Nevin in 1997 to stop her getting any of her late husband’s fortune. They wanted to stop her ‘profiting from her crime’ under the 1965 Succession Act.
Nevin fully defended that High Court case until her death, and with that action yet to be finalised, representatives of her estate are continuing to honour her stance.
Nevin wanted the courts to prevent Tom Nevin’s family from relying on her murder conviction in their bid to disinherit her.
The High Court disagreed with her, but she pursued appeals all the way to the Supreme Court, having lodged that final appeal months before her death.
Ordering costs against Nevin’s estate, Chief Justice Frank Clarke ruled yesterday: ‘The appellant [Nevin], having chosen to appeal to the Court of Appeal and Supreme Court, must accept the consequences of having added significantly to the costs of the case by bringing those two appeals.’
The matter of who will pay the bill for the High Court case so far won’t be decided until that case is determined.
Nevin’s estate is 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 the estate of his late wife Celine Cawley.
Catherine Nevin felt she was due Mr Nevin’s full €1.1million estate, which includes Jack White’s Inn – sold in 1997 for the equivalent of €787,000 – and two properties in Dublin 8. The publican also had a policy worth almost €100,000 and about €250,000 in a bank account.
paul.caffrey@dailymail.ie