The battle still rages on for the ownership rights of Anne Heche’s estate.
Heche’s oldest son, Homer Laffoon, filed new court documents this week opposing the validity of a 2011 email his mother sent ex-boyfriend James Tupper appointing him executor of her estate.
Laffoon says the email fails to satisfy the legal requirements for a valid formal witnessed will because it was not signed by Heche. Nor does it have two witnesses who signed the document during her lifetime.
“Mr. Tupper repeatedly refers to the email as a ‘will.’ However, as a matter of law, the email does not qualify as either a holographic will or formal witnessed will,” Laffoon wrote in his filing.
Therefore, Laffoon states, “I am the person with the highest priority of appointment and I’m legally entitled to appointment as administrator.”
Laffoon also added, “It wasn’t uncommon for my mom to send emails, such as the one attached, when she was faced with uncertainty. In fact, my mom sent a similar email to her book keeper on April 7, 2020, after she contracted Covid-19.”
“This document, which fails to qualify as a will on the same basis as the email makes no reference whatsoever to Mr. Tupper, which is not surprising given their acrimonious breakup in 2018,” Laffoon argues.
After his mother’s death on August 12, Laffoon filed a petition to be named executor of her estate and requested that he and his half-brother, Atlas Tupper, be listed as their mother’s sole heirs.
However, Tupper, who fathered 13-year-old Atlas with Heche, filed his own documents in which he claimed that the late star sent him an email in January 2011 that read, “FYI in case I die tomorrow and anyone asks. My wishes are that all of my assets go to the control of Mr. James Tupper to be used to raise my children and then given to the children.”
In his filing, Tupper claimed Laffoon was not suitable to run Heche’s estate due to his young age and lack of employment. He also stated that lagoon and his mother had an estranged relationship at the time of her death.
It was so bad according to Tupper, Laffoon actually changed the locks on Heche’s apartment, which she shared with Atlas. Laffoon’s actions prevented Atlas from from gaining access to his belongings inside.
Tupper also claimed that the half-brothers have not had any contact since Heche’s death on Aug. 12.
In his new filing, Laffoon refers to Tupper’s allegations as “unfounded personal attacks” and “frivolous legal claims.”
Heche, who shared Laffoon with ex-husband Coleman Laffoon, died at age 53 after an Aug. 5 car crash that left her in a coma with severe burns and critical injuries. She was later removed from life support, and her organs were donated.
The Los Angeles County medical examiner-coroner listed sternal fracture due to blunt trauma as a contributing factor to her death, which was ruled accidental.
