The Case of the Dixfield Cats

In a modest trailer in Dixfield, Maine live a lucky group of homeless cats – lucky because they are looked after by the Dixfield Cat Ladies.

Twelve years ago one of the Cat Ladies died. She left most of her estate, about $150,000, for the creation of a corporation or trust "for the purpose of providing shelter, food and health care for abandoned and unwanted cats in the Town of Dixfield."

Are the Dixfield cats living in luxury and organic catnip? Not yet. Predictably, bequests to animals produce more snarls than purrs.

Why Pets make Admirable Heirs

Unlike too many humans, they don't squabble over the estate.

Perhaps that's why "more and more animal-lovers [are] leaving fortunes to beloved pampered pets." Read about Chihuahuas with a mansion and a chimp with a farm in Estates Going to the Dogs.

Photo of long-haired chihuahua via Wikimedia Commons

“Grr, Yap, Snarl!”

Animal-welfare groups believe the fortune Leona Helmsley left to the Leona M. and Harry B. Helmsley Charitable Trust should go largely to the dogs. The groups have gone to court on behalf of the four-legged beneficiaries.

The Helmsley trustees disagree. See their statement.

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Cheer up, pups! At least prospects for canine inheritance are looking up in Connecticut. H/T to the Wills, Trusts and Estates Prof for news that the state has enacted a pet trust statute.