Robin Williams' Family Feuding Over Estate

3 children are in legal dispute with widow
By Rob Quinn,  Newser Staff
Posted Feb 3, 2015 2:51 AM CST
Updated Feb 3, 2015 4:03 AM CST
Robin Williams' Family Feuding Over Estate
This Nov. 9, 2009, photo shows Robin Williams and wife-to-be Susan Schneider at the premiere of "Old Dogs" in Los Angeles.   (AP Photo/Katy Winn, FIle)

In a sad but all-too-common postscript to someone's life cut short, Robin Williams' children and wife are locked in a bitter dispute over his estate. In court papers filed in December and January, the comedian's three adult children say they are "heartbroken" that widow Susan Williams is "challenging the plans he so carefully made for his estate" by trying to keep personal effects she's not entitled to, reports the New York Times. The children—Zak, Zelda, and Cody—are from two previous marriages, and they note that Susan was married to their father for "less than three years." They accuse her of adding "insult to a terrible injury" and say she refused to allow them in his Tiburon, Calif., home in the days after his death.

Williams, who committed suicide in August, specified his estate go to his three children, but the dispute centers around a provision that the home, its contents, and enough cash to cover "all costs related to the residence" go to Susan Williams. The children accuse her of wrongly interpreting this to mean she can keep belongings she was never meant to have and of "greedily" trying to claim extra funds. Sources tell TMZ that the widow, who refers to Williams' collections of things like action figures and movie posters as "knickknacks," also argues that "jewelry" doesn't include things like watches. Her lawyer tells the Times that his client doesn't have "sticky fingers" and "compared to what the Williams children were set to receive from their father, this is a bucket of water in a lake." (More Robin Williams stories.)

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