Current Trends - Mystery Will: A New Chapter in Tony Hseih's Estate
- Jenny Rozelle, Host of Legal Tea
- 4 days ago
- 7 min read
Hey there, Legal Tea Listeners – This is your host, Jenny Rozelle. Welcome back for another episode, which is a “current trends” topic where we talk about things going on currently that are relevant and pertinent to my estate and elder law world, and/or maybe things I’ve seen on the news or stumbled across on social media. Well today’s episode is a little of both – we are going to talk about Tony Hsieh, which I actually did an episode on his estate way, way back in episode 35 – but there have been some recent headlines regarding his estate that just absolutely called for an “update episode” – so I’m going to give a bit of a recap of what was reported on initially, and what episode 35 talked about, and then we’re going to get into what is going on more recently that is JUICY, I tell you!
You might recognize Tony Hsieh's name – he was the CEO of Zappos for over two decades. Born in Illinois, Tony moved to California at age five, graduated from Harvard with a computer science degree in 1995, and co-founded LinkExchange the following year. Microsoft bought LinkExchange for $265 million just two years later. Not bad for a guy in his twenties! In 1999, Tony joined Zappos as CEO when the company was just an idea about selling shoes online. By 2000, Zappos had $1.6 million in sales. Nine years later? One billion dollars in revenue. Amazon acquired Zappos in 2009 for approximately $1.2 billion, netting Tony around $214 million. He stayed on as CEO until retiring in August 2020 after 21 years.
Just three months after retirement, Tony was involved in a house fire at 3:30 AM while visiting family in Connecticut. He was transported to a hospital but succumbed to his injuries on November 27, 2020. The Fire Marshal found evidence suggesting Tony may have been impaired at the time of the fire. What followed revealed a heartbreaking picture of Tony's mental health struggles. According to the Las Vegas Review Journal, friends had arranged trips to a Montana ranch to help him, but his behavior had become increasingly erratic. He offered a friend $1 million to be his alarm clock, thought gunmen were attacking their bus, and even asked friends to join him in a suicide pact. Some have wondered if may have set the fatal fire himself.
Here's where this story becomes a cautionary tale for our purposes: Tony, despite his massive wealth and access to countless lawyers, died without any estate plan – at least at his immediate passing, that is what was being reported. Reports were claiming no Will, no Trust, nothing. (That has since changed – in recent reports, which we’ll get into.) His father Richard, and brother, Andrew, are currently managing his estate through probate court, and the results have been absolutely chaotic. Through probate, and because Tony initially was thought to have no estate plan, Tony’s assets would be distributed according to Nevada's intestacy laws – meaning the state decided who Tony’s estate beneficiaries would be.
Fast forward to today … It’s been nearly five years since the death of Tony and his estate is now the center of an increasingly bizarre and high-stakes legal battle. Well, if you remember from the original episode, the estate was dealing with some wild things – including creditor claims to the tune of $150 Million Dollars, contracts said in air quotes written on post-it notes, etc. So because of all the craziness and weirdness that had taken place initially, one would think people would not be shocked anymore about what else was in store – until the sudden appearance of a surprise Last Will and Testament—one that no one saw coming, and few can explain. Now, with over half a billion dollars at stake, Tony’s family, lawyers, and a newly introduced set of actors are heading into what may be the most complex and curious estate dispute in recent memory. So let’s talk about the recent developments…
Up first: the surprise Will. Discovered in Pakistan. Yes, you heard that right.
In early 2025, attorneys from two U.S. law firms—McDonald Carano and Greenberg Traurig—submitted a previously unseen Last Will and Testament to the probate court in Clark County, Nevada. Dated March 13, 2015, the Will designates three co-executors: Robert Armstrong, a Nevada attorney; Mark Ferrario, a Las Vegas litigator; and, most surprisingly, a man named Pir Muhammad, who had passed away in 2022 in Pakistan. Muhammad, who reportedly suffered from dementia or Alzheimer’s, had the document among his personal effects when he died. His connection to Tony remains unclear. Neither Attorney Armstrong nor Attorney Ferrario had any personal or professional relationship with Tony before their names appeared on the Will, and both have stated they were unaware of the document’s existence until recently. So understandably, eyebrows across the estate and legal communities shot up.
Something else that has happened is that Tony’s father, Richard, as the court-appointed Executor / Administrator has been administering his son’s estate under Nevada’s intestacy laws—since no Will was thought to exist until now. As soon as this new Will was submitted, Attorney Armstrong and Attorney Ferrario’s legal teams filed a petition to admit it to probate, remove Richard as administrator, and appoint themselves as executors. (One note on this – Tony’s father, Richard, if you remember was appointed as Co-Executor with Tony’s brother/Richard’s other son, Andrew. Well, Andrew resigned from that role in 2023 – and there’s some stuff there too, which we’ll get into if we have time.)
So, back to the surprise Will’s Executors trying to remove Richard … needless to say, Richard is not taking this lightly. His legal team, led by Holland & Knight, has launched a full-scale investigation to determine whether the will is authentic and legally valid. Subpoenas have been issued for: (1) Court clerk records to uncover who filed the Will and how; (2) Security footage from the courthouse at the time of filing; (3) Envelopes or correspondence attached to the submission; and (4) Landlord records and potential contact info for witnesses to the Will. I mean, if you think about this, this is not just merely a procedural spat—it’s about controlling a massive estate and protecting Tony’s legacy. And the “who” that does that is an estate’s Executor.
So, you may be wondering … What does the surprise Will say? Oh … well the contents of the will are as fascinating as the mystery surrounding its appearance. Some of the things I wanted to mention are: (1) Roughly $50 million in assets and multiple Las Vegas properties designated for placement into unnamed trusts; (2) There are some Charitable bequests like $3 million to Harvard University (Tony’s alma mater), $500,000 to the American Red Cross, $250,000 each to the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, Ford Foundation, and Buffett Foundation; (3) Family distributions of $500,000 each to four unnamed immediate family members; and lastly, (4) it also contained a no-contest clause, which would strip beneficiaries of their inheritance if they challenge the will in court. Harvard, as some beneficiaries choose to do, has already filed for special notice in the case, signaling its desire to monitor developments as a major named beneficiary.
Interestingly, some are saying that while the Will outlines substantial charitable intent, its formatting and language have been described by some as “convoluted” and lacking the precision typical of professionally drafted estate plans. Some lawyers speculate the Will may have been created without full legal assistance, which gets into a final thing I wanted to touch on – Tony’s capacity at time of creating this surprise Will. Ever since the beginning of Tony’s estate case, questions of Tony mental state loom large over this case. In the years leading up to his death, his behavior had become increasingly erratic like I previously mentioned. Now, attorneys representing the estate are suggesting those issues should be taken into account when assessing whether the 2015 surprise Will was drafted with full legal capacity—even if it predates his more public decline.
Before I wrap up, if I had time, which I do, I wanted to touch briefly on what happened involving Tony’s brother/Richard’s other son, Andrew Hsieh, who resigned as a Co-Executor in the summer of 2023, just a few years after Tony had passed/probate had started. That change was recorded officially, though it did not remove his legal accountability for matters that arose during his tenure. I say that because … Andrew has been accused of enriching himself by taking "several million" dollars from Tony’s estate. This allegedly included a $200,000 Mercedes purchase and $100,000 spent on a personal nutritionist and training plan, among others. These claims emerged during a lawsuit initiated by Tony’s financial manager, Tony Lee, who is suing the estate for unpaid compensation tied to their work on Tony’s projects in Park City, Utah. All of this continues to unfold within the broader probate case.
Where things stand now are just … well it’s difficult to predict how the situation will resolve. If the court admits the 2015 Will and appoints Attorney Armstrong and Attorney Ferrario as executors, Richard, the father, could be removed from managing his son’s estate—something the family would likely contest vigorously. On the other hand, if the court finds the Will invalid due to questions of execution, authenticity, or Tony’s mental capacity, the estate may remain under Richard’s administration. In either case, the stakes are, of course, very high. As the legal battle unfolds, it also underscores just how critical proper estate planning—and proper documentation—can be, even for the most successful people like Tony. This episode will drop in early/mid August, and I’m recording this in mid-July – I say that because there are a couple of hearing that are supposed to taking place on July 17th and July 31st, so between this recording and when it gets released, there may be additional headlines that happen. What a wild turn of events, huh!
Alrighty, let’s wrap this episode up, shall we? Next week, we’re back to the “celebrity estate planning” type of episode – so, for this episode, I’m going to dive into either Brooke Astor (As-terr) or Lauren Bacall (Buh-call) … I haven’t decided yet, so one of those ladies will be next week and probably the next time we get to a celebrity estate planning episode, I’ll do the other one! So yeah, next week will be either on Brooke or Lauren, TBD, so tune in for that next week, Legal Tea Listeners. Talk to you then!
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