Bitter inheritance row after stamp collector leaves fortune to cleaner

A bitter row has broken out after an elderly stamp collector sold his £200,000 collection to his cleaner for just £1, before leaving most of his £250,000 estate to her in his will.

Ray Watts handed over the valuable trove of stamps to his cleaner and informal carer Sue Pope for a nominal fee before he passed away at the age of 90 in 2021.

Then shortly after his death it was revealed he had also given her around £200,000 from the value of his estate, having changed his will two years before his passing.

While the three children from his first marriage were given £15,000 each from the £250,000 estate, Mr Watts disinherited the three step-children from his second marriage, leaving them with nothing and sparking an acrimonious court row.

His step-daughter, Beverley Neate, is now fighting to overturn the will claiming he could not really have intended to disinherit her after previously planning to split his estate between the six children and step-children, a court has heard.

Mrs Neate, daughter of Mr Watts' second wife, has taken the case to Central London County Court, claiming Mrs Pope cannot prove that it reflected her stepfather's true intentions.

But Mrs Pope - who says she was far more than a cleaner and carer to her friend Mr Watts - is fighting back, claiming that he wanted to cut out his 'disrespectful' stepdaughter after she changed the locks at his home when he was in hospital.

Judge Nigel Gerald was told that Mr Watts had three children - Nicholas and Lesley Watts and Deborah Humphreys - by his first wife Madeline Watts, before she died in 1995.

He went on to remarry, to Fay Watts in 1998, with her children Mrs Neate and sons Mark and Sean Brennan becoming his stepchildren. She died in 2011.

Mr Watts had been a clerk at Lloyds Bank during his working life, but in retirement devoted himself to philately, attending fairs and dealing in stamps.

His stock, valued by Mrs Neate at £200,000, included stamps dating back as far as the 1840s.

Mrs Pope came into Mr Watts' life after he placed an advertisement for a cleaner, but gradually she took on more and more duties until she was caring for him too.

Under a will written in 2007, Mr Watts had intended to leave his estate - including his share of the family home in Great Waldingfield, near Sudbury, Suffolk - to his six children and stepchildren equally.

But a new will was made in 2019 after he had been admitted to hospital after a serious fall at home, following which he had lain undiscovered for hours.

That one left £15,000 to each of his three children and Mrs Neate, with the rest of an estate valued at about £250,000 going to Mrs Pope.

However, he then executed a codicil - a document altering the effect of a will - in 2020, slashing Mrs Neate's share to a 'deliberately derisory' legacy of a single pound, the court heard.

Challenging the validity of the will and codicil, Mrs Neate's lawyers claim that Mrs Pope cannot show that the ailing pensioner had 'knowledge and approval' of its contents - legal language meaning they represented his 'testamentary intentions'.

Her barrister Nathan Wells said Mr Watts had been described in hospital as 'confused with a reduced level of consciousness' and that there had been a 'slowing of his thinking'.

There was also evidence of 'significant' involvement of Mrs Pope in the making of the will, with her contacting solicitors to attend to Mr Watts in hospital, he said.

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Mr Wells said: 'In addition to the evidence of a failing mind and the evidence of significant beneficiary involvement, there were a number of other circumstances surrounding the making of the 2019 will which should excite the suspicion of the court.

'The terms of the 2019 will represented a radical change from the provisions of the 2007 will, which is recognised as a factor going to knowledge and approval.

'Because of the concerns about the deceased's "failing mind" and the obvious and substantial degree of beneficiary involvement, Mrs Pope also has to meet the stricter requirements for establishing knowledge and approval.

'Mrs Neate confirms that it would have been very out of character for the deceased to do something as spiteful as leaving her a deliberately derisory legacy of £1 in his will.'

Mrs Neate claimed to have had a 'good relationship' with her stepfather, adding: 'I cannot reconcile the instructions behind that codicil with the Ray that I had known for so many years.'

Her barrister said there had been continued contact between the two of them, with Mrs Neate providing assistance with medical appointments, while Mr Watts would spend Christmas with her and her husband.

For Mrs Pope, barrister Elis Gomer told the judge she was not being accused of 'undue influence,' but simply being required by Mrs Neate to prove that the will and codicil reflected Mr Watts' 'true wishes'.

He said the stepdaughter's challenge was based on a 'rather nebulous jumble of allegations' and that the will and codicil were perfectly valid.

He insisted Mr Watts wanted Mrs Pope to benefit from his 2019 will and had gone on to further slash his stepdaughter's inheritance to £1 because of her 'disrespectful' actions in having changed the locks on his home when he was in hospital.

Mr Gomer went on: 'Mrs Pope's position is that the 2019 will and the 2020 codicil were prepared at the deceased's instigation, read over with him, and in every respect reflected his testamentary wishes as he expressed them to be.

'Mrs Pope's position is simply that the 2019 will arose out of a desire to benefit Mrs Pope.

'The 2020 codicil came about as a result of the deceased's view that Mrs Neate's behaviour towards the end of his life was – to use the deceased's words – "disrespectful and distressing", to the point that he no longer wished to make any meaningful provision for Mrs Neate.'

He said Mrs Pope's account had been corroborated by Mr Watts' three biological children, with Nicholas Watts saying his father considered he had given the three children enough during his lifetime.

The barrister added: 'The 2019 will was executed in circumstances whereby the deceased had been admitted to hospital following a fall.

'Mrs Pope's diaries eloquently demonstrate the lengths to which she was going to care for the deceased and the role she played in his life at this point - including, notably, helping him with and taking an interest in his passion for philately, described by Mrs Neate as the "sole focus" of the deceased's life.

'It is submitted that it is neither surprising nor suspicious that the deceased wished to make provision for Mrs Pope in these circumstances.'

He also criticised Mrs Neate's repeated reference to Mrs Pope as a 'cleaner' in case documents - saying that despite beginning as a paid cleaner, she had gone on to become much more involved in his life.

Mr Gomer told the court: 'Mrs Neate's antipathy towards Mrs Pope in these proceedings is palpable.

'It was quite apparent from at least 2015 onwards that the extent of Mrs Pope's involvement with the deceased was far in excess of anything one might expect from a paid domestic cleaner between providing care, attending stamp fairs with the deceased and assisting with other aspects of his life.

'Similarly, Mrs Pope's position is that the execution of the 2020 codicil was prompted by a series of incidents involving behaviour by Mrs Neate which the deceased found disrespectful and distressing.'

This included her going to the house and having the locks changed while he was in hospital - although Mrs Neate claims she had a right to do so, because she holds half of the house on trust from her mother's will and because Mrs Pope had already changed the locks herself, the court heard.

Mr Gomer called Mrs Neate's case 'an exceptionally thin one', which he said was 'based primarily on her own assessment of her late stepfather's wishes and "what he would have wanted"'.

He added: 'It is submitted that the objective evidence simply does not support that position and that the deceased knew and approved the terms of the 2019 will and the 2020 codicil.'

On top of her £200,000 share of Mr Watts' estate Mrs Pope also got his stamp collection for a nominal sum, but says it was worth no more than £40,000 rather than £200,000.

The court heard that the solicitor who drew up a receipt for the sale of Mr Watts' stamp collection to Mrs Pope had noted that he was "concerned that [Mrs Pope] receives all his stamps and related equipment'.

An attendance note describing the lawyer's visit to the hospital said Mrs Pope 'did not wish to accept these as a gift', but that Mr Watts had said he would 'sell everything to her for the price of £1'.

The judge was earlier told that Mrs Pope, despite beginning as Mr Watt's cleaner, had grown close to him and shared his interest in stamp collection, attending fairs with him.

The case continues.