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Equity & Trusts Problem Question Help !

Hi, there I am currently a student studying at home, due to a medical incident, and really need some help with this problem question.

You receive a letter from your client, Barrie Black, of 207 Barnsley Road, London N23 5BB, an ageing rock star, as follows:

“You will have seen that my oldest friend in the business, Cliff Pilchard, died last week. I last saw him in hospital about a fortnight ago. It was pretty touching. He said to me ‘I think I’m about to slip out of the charts, Barrie. If I do, I want you to have these’ – and he gave me a key to a deposit box at his bank where I know he keeps his platinum discs.

They’re not all that valuable in themselves, though I would like to have them. But when I went along to the bank, they said that they could not allow access to Mr Pilchard’s boxes to anyone except the executors.

I contacted the executors, and they told me they thought the discs were part of the estate, which was mostly going to Cliff’s girlfriend.

But they did say I was mentioned in Cliff’s will. Apparently, Cliff left £50,000 to Pete Landman, the record producer, hoping that Pete would use it to help me produce my next album.

Am I entitled to the platinum discs?

Can I use the £50,000 to produce the album myself?”

Reply 1

Forum User

Original post by NickyH19

Hi, there I am currently a student studying at home, due to a medical incident, and really need some help with this problem question.

For the first part, you need to decide whether what Mr Pilchard said and did, in the circumstances in which he said and did it, amounted to a donatio mortis causa of the contents of the deposit box.

For the second part, you need to decide whether the phrase "hoping that Pete would use it to help [Barrie] produce his next album" imposed any obligation on Pete, or if Pete took the £50,000 absolutely with no obligations. This is asking about certainty of intention to create a trust.

Both of those areas will be in any textbook and you should be able to apply them after some reading.

Reply 2

NickyH19

Thank you so much for your help. I was wondering as I have to write it out as two legal letters, one to Barrie and another one to the solicitor, how would i structure it ?