Avoiding Probate the Colombian Way
This story was told me by a middle-age Colombian couple, and although it was presented as true story, it has some fantasy elements that can easily put it in the urban legend category. Except that it contains rural elements.
The place: rural Colombia. A local farmer, businessman and politician had a good life, alternating terms as city mayor with his wife. Let’s call him Bolión Simívar[1] This went on and on over the years. They were a well-respected, wealthy family. They had two children. Up to this point, this will be an ordinary story of success in rural Latin America: the strong man of town, married to the strong women of town. By the time Mr. Simívar got old, he accumulated a fair fortune, product of his lifetime work.
But Mr. Simívar had a secret passion. To be more precise, he had lots of secret passions: he was well known to have a weakness for women, but what set him apart from the rest was that he let that passion flow to the limits, or to be more precise, he let it flow to the limits too often and with too many women.[2]
When wealthy Mr. Simívar died in intestacy, the older of the two sons he had with his wife –let’s call him Big Brother- expected the worst. He started to receive threats by the phone from alleged sons of the deceased, claiming their part form the estate. Decided to protect his patrimony and the future of his mother and brother, he decided to place and advertisement in the local newspaper.
Here is where the story deviates from credible course to enter into the shaken waters of the improbable. The act supposedly read:
To those who consider themselves offspring from the late Mr. Bolión Simívar, they are advised to be present with evidence to identify themselves as his children, at Mr. Simívar’s principal residence, the next Saturday at 12:00. Lunch will be provided.
As a result, more than twenty men and women ranging from ages 19 to 40 showed up to the house of the deceased, somehow accredited themselves as descendants of Mr. Simívar, and Big Brother welcomed them. He gave them a speech highlighting their common ancestor recently died, explained them the disadvantages of fighting over the estate, made an inventory of the estate of inheritance,[3] came up to an amount of money, and divided it between twenty two. He extended checks from his personal account with the correspondent amount, made his coheirs sign a transmission of inheritance rights and a no-lawsuit agreement. At the end, they ended up as a happy family.
If this ending to the story was true, most likely Mr. Bolión Simívar rested in peace. The mechanism used by Big Brother conveniently avoided a never ending conflict that would very likely consume a large part of the estate, and except by the fact that he defrauded his coheirs by hiding properties and money, he was very ingenious and practical in his approach.
The place: rural Colombia. A local farmer, businessman and politician had a good life, alternating terms as city mayor with his wife. Let’s call him Bolión Simívar[1] This went on and on over the years. They were a well-respected, wealthy family. They had two children. Up to this point, this will be an ordinary story of success in rural Latin America: the strong man of town, married to the strong women of town. By the time Mr. Simívar got old, he accumulated a fair fortune, product of his lifetime work.
But Mr. Simívar had a secret passion. To be more precise, he had lots of secret passions: he was well known to have a weakness for women, but what set him apart from the rest was that he let that passion flow to the limits, or to be more precise, he let it flow to the limits too often and with too many women.[2]
When wealthy Mr. Simívar died in intestacy, the older of the two sons he had with his wife –let’s call him Big Brother- expected the worst. He started to receive threats by the phone from alleged sons of the deceased, claiming their part form the estate. Decided to protect his patrimony and the future of his mother and brother, he decided to place and advertisement in the local newspaper.
Here is where the story deviates from credible course to enter into the shaken waters of the improbable. The act supposedly read:
To those who consider themselves offspring from the late Mr. Bolión Simívar, they are advised to be present with evidence to identify themselves as his children, at Mr. Simívar’s principal residence, the next Saturday at 12:00. Lunch will be provided.
As a result, more than twenty men and women ranging from ages 19 to 40 showed up to the house of the deceased, somehow accredited themselves as descendants of Mr. Simívar, and Big Brother welcomed them. He gave them a speech highlighting their common ancestor recently died, explained them the disadvantages of fighting over the estate, made an inventory of the estate of inheritance,[3] came up to an amount of money, and divided it between twenty two. He extended checks from his personal account with the correspondent amount, made his coheirs sign a transmission of inheritance rights and a no-lawsuit agreement. At the end, they ended up as a happy family.
If this ending to the story was true, most likely Mr. Bolión Simívar rested in peace. The mechanism used by Big Brother conveniently avoided a never ending conflict that would very likely consume a large part of the estate, and except by the fact that he defrauded his coheirs by hiding properties and money, he was very ingenious and practical in his approach.
Footnotes:
[1] This is an arbitrary combination of the syllables of the name of Simón Bolivar, the Great Liberator of America -the Continent, of course (practically everywhere outside the United States of America, people consider and study America as a sole continent). For a note on his biography, see generally History of Simon Bolivar, http://www.bolivarmo.com/history.htm. He helped six Latin American countries to achieve their independence –Bolivia, Panama, Colombia, Ecuador, Peru, and Venezuela-. He is referred to as the “George Washington of South America;” I can bet two-to-one that he received the name from an U.S. Citizen, because it would not mean a compliment in some of the Latin American countries he helped to liberate, especially Venezuela in these days.
[2] The Colombian couple who told me this story claim to be related to Mr. Simívar. They said that when he was asked about his demeanor, he always said that organization and time management were the keys to success.
[3] It would not be a genuine Latino story should Big Brother not keep something extra for himself. The inventory he presented had been filtered to hide the most valuable properties, calf and money, supposedly to assure that their mother would not suffer poverty during her last years. The same could be alleged for the more than a dozen mothers to Mr. Simívar’s children, but I guess being the wife should carry some advantages.
[1] This is an arbitrary combination of the syllables of the name of Simón Bolivar, the Great Liberator of America -the Continent, of course (practically everywhere outside the United States of America, people consider and study America as a sole continent). For a note on his biography, see generally History of Simon Bolivar, http://www.bolivarmo.com/history.htm. He helped six Latin American countries to achieve their independence –Bolivia, Panama, Colombia, Ecuador, Peru, and Venezuela-. He is referred to as the “George Washington of South America;” I can bet two-to-one that he received the name from an U.S. Citizen, because it would not mean a compliment in some of the Latin American countries he helped to liberate, especially Venezuela in these days.
[2] The Colombian couple who told me this story claim to be related to Mr. Simívar. They said that when he was asked about his demeanor, he always said that organization and time management were the keys to success.
[3] It would not be a genuine Latino story should Big Brother not keep something extra for himself. The inventory he presented had been filtered to hide the most valuable properties, calf and money, supposedly to assure that their mother would not suffer poverty during her last years. The same could be alleged for the more than a dozen mothers to Mr. Simívar’s children, but I guess being the wife should carry some advantages.
posted by Mastropiero @ 3:27 PM
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