A “raw deal”. That’s what Edmund J. Gorman Jr, the Nevada probate commissioner, had to say about the fait accompli that Rupert and Lachlan Murdoch had placed before the other three senior siblings — Prudence, Elisabeth and James — in late 2023. The siblings rejected it, and now so has the law.
It’s a delicious end-of-season plot twist, setting viewers up for more legal high-jinks when Succession: The Murdoch Saga is inevitably renewed for 2025.
Others have explained Rupert and Lachlan’s cunning plan, along with Gorman’s colourful calling-out of the whole thing as nothing more than “an attempt to stack the deck”. The liberal application of card-playing metaphors was only fitting, this being Nevada and all.
Which brings me to some questions you may be hoping to have answered by the behind-the-scenes doco for the season just ended.
Why Nevada? Do any Murdochs actually live there? I think Rupert’s official residence is New York, or possibly his ranch in Montana when he’s trying to avoid depositions. Lachlan is famously an Aussie, possibly the most Aussie Aussie ever, and the other kids who knows, but anyway the dynasty’s connection with Nevada is not so much about blood as it is money.
In fact, Nevada is the top US state for “asset-protection trusts” like the Murdoch one. This is because there’s no state income tax, no corporate income and no inheritance tax, along with very favourable secrecy laws (for those who love secrecy).
However, the most important advantage Nevada offers is the ability to change the terms of an irrevocable trust (like the Murdoch one). In most states, this is impossible, as it would be in Australia — that’s kind of the point of irrevocability. Clearly, by registering the trust in Nevada, Rupert was as usual thinking several chess moves ahead.
The legal ace Rupert was trying to play now is one that would allow him to switch over to a new trust, with new trustees, provided he could satisfy the probate court that he is acting “in good faith and for the sole benefit of the heirs”.
And it would have worked, if not for that pesky probate commissioner. Determining that Rupert and Lachlan were acting with none of those qualities, Gorman shot two bullet holes in their neatly stacked deck.
What next? Well, this is the legal system, and also the most enduring soap opera in history, so the plot has plenty of room for further narrative development.
First, Gorman is not a judge. He’s a commissioner, whose job was to hear the evidence and come up with findings that support a recommendation. That goes to a district court judge, who can accept or reject it, although I’m guessing that overturning such stark factual findings would be quite a stretch.
After that, appeals, up to the top level of the Nevada judicial system, which I assume is a court convened at Caesars Palace in Vegas.
Okay not really, they stopped doing that when the Five Families gave up ownership of the casinos, but it is good to see Nevada maintaining some semblance of its historical attractiveness for those who love money and don’t like to talk about it.
Personally, I prefer the Montana version of justice, if that other dynastic spectacular Yellowstone is any guide, where court rulings are interposed liberally with men in cowboy hats being shot dead on the toilet or taken across the border to Wyoming and unceremoniously de-cliffed.
I know, this is real life not TV, and the Murdochs are not into that kind of thing. As Lachlan texted Elisabeth that morning in late 2023 just before the big pow-wow when his cunning plan was to be executed, “Today is about Dad’s wishes and confirming all our support for him and for his wishes. It shouldn’t be difficult or controversial. Love you, Lachlan.”
Bless.
Next season is going to rate its goddamn head off.
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