A city lawyer has lost an inheritance fight with her nephew after claiming she gifted him her one-third share of her mother’s £1.7m fortune ‘by mistake’.
Marie Ginette Gauchenot, an international corporate lawyer, reconnected with her nephew Jean-Michel Canarapen at her mother’s funeral after not ‘seeing each other for several years’.
After previously being ‘estranged’, she subsequently ‘developed a considerable degree of love and affection’ for him.
Ms Gauchenot, 75, had been left in charge of administering the estate of her mother, Brigitte Maghoo, who died in 2021.
Consisting largely of Ms Maghoo’s £1.7m house in Dancer Road, Fulham, Ms Gauchenot received a third of her wealth, with the rest going to her two sisters and some of their children, but excluding Mr Canarapen, 50.
Ms Maghoo lived in the five-storey home for over half a century, and it was also Ms Gauchenot’s childhood home.
She agreed a deed handing her one-third share of the home to her nephew, and discussed with him buying the rest of the house to keep it in the family.
But they fell out over his plan to split the house into flats which he would then rent them out.
The home was later sold on the open market and the court’s ruling means he does not have to pay her back his share of the proceeds – £560,000.
Marie Ginette Gauchenot, an international corporate lawyer, (pictured) reconnected with her nephew Jean-Michel Canarapen at her mother’s funeral after not ‘seeing each other for several years’
After previously being ‘estranged’, Mr Canarapen (pictured with his wife) reconnected with his aunt at his grandmother’s funeral after not ‘seeing each other for several years’
Ms Gauchenot had been left in charge of administering the estate of her millionaire mother, Brigitte Maghoo, consisting largely of her £1.7m house in Dancer Road, Fulham (pictured)
The judge has ruled her nephew gets to keep the cash because the deed was not dependent on him following through on buying and preserving his grandmother’s house.
Giving his ruling at London’s High Court, Master Iain Pester said that when family matriarch Ms Maghoo died, she left behind a net estate worth £1,679,570.
He said the aunt and nephew had ‘reconnected’ at Ms Maghoo’s funeral after a period of ‘estrangement’ and ‘having not seen each other for several years’.
A month later, Mr Canarapen texted his aunt, telling her: ‘I have got an amazing idea, I think Mamie would be proud and it will keep the house in the family forever. No one would be able to sell it,’ to which Ms Gauchenot replied that she was ‘all ears’.
The pair discussed him buying the house from the other beneficiaries, and at an Easter lunch in 2022, Ms Gauchenot told him she was going to hand him her share of the inheritance.
This would enable ‘him to buy the property with her one-third share and keep the house in the family’ as it ‘would help to heal if not alleviate all the past hurt he had suffered’.
However, after falling out Ms Gauchenot claimed she only agreed to hand her nephew her share of the inheritance ‘under a mistaken belief that he intended to acquire the property from the deceased’s estate and preserve it as a family home’.
She sent her nephew an emotional email, saying: ‘As you recall, I offered to transfer my share of the inheritance to you, based on your representations made to me that you wanted to keep the house as a legacy.
‘You would not make any structural changes to the house, in order to quote you “to keep the smell and to feel the presence of mamie always in Dancer Rd.”
‘All that seems to have evaporated.
‘I am very, very disappointed Michel in you.
‘Were you lying to me all this time, including about caring for me, for Mamie, for Dancer Rd?
‘You have annihilated me and I cannot believe all this is happening to me.’
Mr Canarapen insisted the promise to hand over the inheritance and the plan to keep the house in the family were two separate things and not dependent on each other.
He went on to sue his aunt to enforce the deed, varying the inheritance plans.
Giving his ruling and finding in favour of Mr Canarapen, Master Pester said that, after getting back in touch, there had been a ‘considerable degree of love and affection’ between aunt and nephew.
He said: ‘By way of illustration, the defendant wrote to the claimant by text on November 12, 2021, saying “know too that you can always, always count on me, because you are my family. Thank you for being so close”.’
‘This closeness was then replaced by a bitter falling out, with the defendant, among other things, accusing the claimant of having lied to her.
‘There is now a high degree of hostility and anger between the parties which colours their recollection of past events.
‘The defendant’s case [is] that the deed was not delivered, the deed was made by the defendant under a mistaken belief that the claimant intended to acquire the property from the deceased’s estate and preserve it as a family home by settling it on trust.
‘This was a mistake, in that the claimant either did not intend to preserve the property as a family home or was not in fact in a position to do so, because the claimant intended to subdivide the property into flats, which would be rented out.
‘The claimant submits that this is a simple case.
‘The defendant made a gift which she now regrets.
‘She executed the deed and provided a copy to the claimant without any indication that it was not intended to take immediate effect.
‘The context in which the deed was executed was that the claimant was hoping to buy the property from the estate and the defendant wished to facilitate the claimant’s efforts to progress that proposal by helping him prove that he had the necessary deposit.
‘However, that context does not give the defendant the right to set aside or deny the gift she made.
‘It does not follow, either as a matter of fact or law, that the deed’s validity was conditional on a purchase of the property by the claimant.’
The judge also went on to find against Ms Gauchenot’s claim that she would have had a right to stay in her childhood home for life rather than it being rented out as a condition of her handing over her inheritance.
‘The bargain between the two parties, as now alleged by the defendant, is fundamentally unattractive from the claimant’s point of view,’ he said.
‘I do not believe that the claimant would ever have been willing to enter such a lopsided deal.
‘I therefore reject the defendant’s contention that she believed that she would have any right to stay at the property for life.
‘On that basis, the defendant’s case to rescind the deed for mistake fails.’
