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Thursday, August 06, 2009

Courts - "Writing Expert Says Astor’s Signature Was Forged"

Updating this list of earlier ILB entries on the Brooke Astor estate dispute, John Eligon wrote yesterday in the NYT City Room Blog:

Analyzing the arcs and spaces that an untrained eye might not catch on Brooke Astor’s signature on a 2004 document, Gus R. Lesnevich came to an unequivocal conclusion.

“I have absolutely no doubt it’s not Brooke Astor’s signature,” Mr. Lesnevich said on Wednesday in State Supreme Court in Manhattan.

That testimony by Mr. Lesnevich, a forensic document examiner and prosecution witness, appeared to be a blow to Francis X. Morrissey Jr., an estate lawyer who prosecutors have accused of forging Mrs. Astor’s signature on that March 3, 2004, codicil to her will. * * *

Mr. Lesnevich, who said he had examined more than 240 of Mrs. Astor’s signatures dating back to 1953, testified that there were four reasons he believed that the signature was not hers.

There was no space between the “r” and the “o” in “Brooke,” something she had done in all but one of the signatures he examined, Mr. Lesnevich said. Her maiden name, “Russell,” was used, and in that, too, Mr. Lesnevich testified, he found an inconsistency. In 29 prior signatures, she left a space after the “u” and printed the “ss” in block letters. On the codicil, there is no space and the “ss” is not legible.

The final two inconsistencies have to do with the signature’s neatness. The name was written more legibly than on other things she signed at about the same time. At the time of this codicil, Mrs. Astor was nearly 102, and, according to Mr. Lesnevich, she was not writing very clearly. The “Astor” in particular is more legible than the “Brooke Russell,” Mr. Lesnevich said.

“When you get to the last name, ‘Astor,’ all of a sudden you have a beautifully, well-crafted signature,” Mr. Lesnevich said.

The final problem, Mr. Lesnevich said, is that the letters are evenly aligned. “She can’t write that well,” he said.

The codicil provided that all the homes Mrs. Astor owned be sold after her death and that the money be added to her estate. A larger estate would mean greater executors’ fees, and Mr. Marshall, 85, and Mr. Morrissey, 66, were both listed as executors.

Posted by Marcia Oddi on August 6, 2009 10:06 AM
Posted to Courts in general