Celebrity Estate Planning - Gene Hackman & Betsy Arakawa - Episode 191
- Jenny Rozelle, Host of Legal Tea
- Apr 8
- 8 min read
Hey there, Legal Tea Listeners! This is your host, Jenny Rozelle. We’re back to “estate planning of the rich and famous” where we chat about celebrities and their estate planning (or lack thereof!). Today’s episode is about Gene Hackman and his spouse, Betsy Arakawa, and not really about their literal estate plans because as I sit here recording today in mid-March, not much has come out about their estate plans, but there are a few takeaways that I wanted to chat about on here – and depending on how quickly things are released, I may end up having to do a second episode on them. We’ll see! But for today, I want to talk about three main things – First, about why you should have a provision in your estate plan for, what is called, “simultaneous deaths.” And second, I want to talk about how important it is to have back-up or successors listed in your estate plan. Lastly, there is some talk about trying to block some of the photos from the death investigation from getting out to the public. Gene and Betsy’s estate are shining a light on these things, so that’s what I want to talk about today. However, before we really dive in, let’s chat about them before we dive into estate stuff.
According to Biography.com, Gene Hackman, a famous American actor, was born on January 30, 1930, in California. His career spanned over six decades, during which he delivered memorable performances in films such as "The French Connection," "Unforgiven," "Bonnie and Clyde," and “Hoosiers” which is a classic in my book – given I’m in Indiana. Anyway, he retired from acting in 2004 and subsequently focused on writing. More personally-speaking, Gene was married twice. His first marriage was to a lady named Faye Maltese from 1956 to 1986, and together, they had three children: Christopher, Elizabeth, and Leslie. A few year after he and Faye split, then in 1991, he married Betsy Arakawa, a musician. They resided in Sante Fe, New Mexico. Of note, Gene and Betsy did not have children together.
Sadly, on February 26, 2025, Gene, at the age of 95, and Betsy, at the age of 65, were both found deceased in their Santa Fe home. Authorities reported that the couple likely been dead for several days before their discovery. In a press conference on March 7th, a few major updated were released – First, that Betsy appeared to have died about a week before Gene. They shared that it is difficult, if not impossible, to give exact times of each of their deaths, but given all of the information, they stated Betsy died first – and about a week before Gene died. A second thing that was shared during the press conference was that Gene suffered from advanced Alzheimer’s disease, but he ultimately died due to heart disease. It was not really said, but sort of insinuated, that perhaps due to his advanced Alzheimer’s, it’s possible that he was unable to understand that Betsy had passed away – and that’s why there was such a strange lapse in time between their deaths (and why it was not reported either).
Even though Besty and Gene did not die the same day, their deaths may still be classified as a “simultaneous death” depending on state law and/or what their estate plans state (which I do believe they have an estate plan). What is important to know about simultaneous death provisions is that … When spouses or family members pass away simultaneously, it can sometimes create complex legal issues for administering the estates. In some estate plans, a simultaneous death provision is incorporated into the document, which ideally addresses this scenario by establishing a predetermined order of death when it's IMPOSSIBLE to determine who died first. So, what it does more logistically is that it typically designates that one spouse predeceased the other for legal purposes, which, in turn, allows for a smoother transfer of assets according to their wishes and potentially minimizing headaches, fees, and possibly taxes.
This topic actually hits me personally. Never in a million years did I think something like this would happen to my own family, but it did. If you’re a faithful Legal Tea Listener, you know I talked about this on a past episode, but as a recap… in 2014, my Uncle, Aunt, and cousin Katrina were traveling and while stopped in a construction zone in Indiana, a semi truck behind them did not stop in time. The accident killed my Uncle and Aunt, and severely injured my cousin. So, the purpose of sharing this is because my Aunt and Uncle’s Wills did NOT have what are called “simultaneous death” provisions in their estate plan. Because of that, it actually created some extra hurdles and headaches to determine who, in all likelihood, died second. This is critically important because their Wills’ beneficiaries were different – that is because they were a blended family and had their respective children as beneficiaries after each other. But since they both passed away, the unfortunate question was – who died second and whose Will governs? Thankfully and ultimately, all of the kids ended up coming to an agreement of how things were divvied out – but you can imagine there are many, many families that would not be able to agree.
As I said at the beginning of this episode, oftentimes, a “simultaneous death” provision will say something like, “If we die and the timing of our deaths cannot be established, then XYZ happens …” and that way, there’s a pre-determined path without having to deal with who died first or second. It just sort of “skips” to this provision to tell us what to do. Now, something else to know is that usually that same provision applies to a back-to-back death between who did their Will or Trust and a beneficiary, and those provisions will say something like, “If any beneficiary is living at the time of our death, but fails to survive thirty (or whatever number) of days, then XYZ happens.” So, it’s good to know this provision can apply between spouses, but also between the estate plan creator and a beneficiary too. The handy thing about these types of provisions is that it gives express direction and instruction to your Executor or Trustee on what specifically to do in the event something like that unfortunately happen. Rather than relying on the beneficiaries to have to agree to something (like in my family’s case), it’s already spelled out.
So, we will see if it comes out that Gene and Betsy’s estate plans had a provision like this, but I thought since their deaths happened so close, it would be a great example of this type of provision. Let’s now shift to the second thing I want to talk about … and that was making sure we have back-ups and successors listed in documents for the various estate roles…
In a New York Post article, which was talking about trying to block pictures from getting out of the death investigation at Gene and Betsy’s house, it stated that the estates are represented by a lady named Julia Peters, who is with Avalon Trust Company. In a Petition to the Court, it states that Julia Peters was the “third choice” for the estate’s representative. It said that the first choice was each other (Gene and Betsy for each other – which hello, that would have been problematic had only Betsy died and Gene been named as estate representative with advanced Alzheimer’s). The second choice for the estate representative was an attorney, Michael Sutin, but the Petition shared that he died in 2019. So, up next, was Julia Peters. So, THIS is why you should always, always, always list back-ups and successors in your documents’ roles – don’t just list one person and maybe list more than just two people. In Gene and Betsy’s documents, it appears they, at the very least, listed three – each other first, Michael the attorney, then Julia. That’s the second thing I think Gene and Betsy’s deaths and estates teach us – That, you never know what life is going to bring, so that’s why it is a good idea to list back-ups as a “just in case.”
The third thing I wanted to mention and briefly chat about regarding Gene and Betsy’s estates was a more recent update (though, as time passes, a lot keeps coming out –so by the time this episode airs, I’m sure this recording may be slightly outdated) … anyway, the third thing I wanted to talk about was that according to the New York Post article referenced already and linked in the source links for the episode, the estates are requesting that all the photos and videos, including policy bodycam footage, be blocked from getting released to the public. The estate’s attorney, Kurt Sommer, which likely represents Julia Peters, the estate representative, is who filed the Petition with the Court. In the Petition, he is arguing that the “right to privacy outweighs the public interest in the couple’s death.” He even cited Kurt Cobain’s death in his petition, which in that case, the Court blocked the release of photographs of Kurt’s death. This New York Post article was released in mid-March, so maybe by the time this episode airs, we’ll have an answer on what the Judge decided. This sort of stuff is public record, so I guess if you’re really interested, you can probably get your hands on it.
The reason I wanted to bring this part of their estates up is because as the estate representative, as Executor for example, sometimes you may find yourselves in a situation where you want or need further guidance on something or maybe you want to ask the Judge for their blessing or to get clarity on something or maybe you want to ask the Judge to stop or block something (like here) – know, that’s an option. While it does not happen a whole lot, it does happen occasionally. Especially in a case like this, with Gene and Betsy, there will probably be other things that the estate representative asks of the Judge since this case, their deaths, and the closeness of their deaths is pretty unique and does not happen often – and not only is doing that protecting the representative, but it’s sort of putting the burden on the Judge to weigh options, weigh things and ultimately make a decision.
So, we will just have to wait and see what happens with this case. I’m sure that we’re just starting to scratch the surface of things, so depending on what happens, I may have to do an update episode eventually! Alrighty, let’s wrap this episode up and shift to a sneak peak at next week. Next week we’re back to a “cautionary tale” episode where we talk about real-life clients, real-life cases that I, or my office, have worked on -or- maybe they are just generally good things to know/be aware of so you don’t slip up and turn into a cautionary tale one day. Next week’s episode is going to fall on April 15th – which is Tax Day. So, given the day, I figured I’d do something tax-related, which in my opinion, is a bit boring, but I figured I could do an episode on 2025 numbers to know for tax purposes and well, we’ll just see what else I have time for in that episode. So yeah, next week will be on that … until then, Legal Tea Listeners…take care and be well!
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