The Reiner Case and a $1.5 Million Question

“Revocable trust” sounds reassuringly flexible. Change it. Amend it. Tear it up and start over. But revocable for whom?

The legal battle over Nick Reiner’s $1.5 million trust offers an unusually dramatic lesson in what trusts can, and cannot, do.

Nick Reiner has pleaded not guilty to charges that he murdered his parents, Rob Reiner and Michele Singer Reiner, in December 2025. Meanwhile, another fight is taking place in probate court. Nick wants access to money his parents placed in trust for him, including approximately $558,000 that he says should have been distributed when he turned 30.

The trustee has resisted, citing California’s “slayer statute,” which embodies a very old principle: you should not be allowed to inherit from someone you intentionally killed.

Nick’s response, essentially, is: But what if the money was already mine? And that is where an awful family tragedy becomes an interesting estate-planning lesson.

Revocable Doesn’t Mean the Beneficiary Is in Charge

A revocable trust gives the person who created it flexibility during life. It does not necessarily give beneficiaries control over trust assets.

After the grantor dies, the rules change. The trust generally becomes irrevocable, the trustee must follow its terms, and state law supplies additional rules that may override what otherwise looks like a beneficiary’s entitlement. In other words, putting someone’s name in a trust is not the same as handing them a check.

When Does “You’re Entitled to It” Mean “It’s Yours”?

The particularly interesting wrinkle in the Reiner case involves timing. Nick contends that approximately $558,000 became due to him when he turned 30, well before his parents died. If that distribution was mandatory and had already vested, is the money really an inheritance from his parents’ deaths? Or was it already Nick’s property, sitting in a trust account waiting to be delivered? That question remains unresolved.

But it highlights something estate planners sometimes overlook: mandatory age-based distributions can eliminate protections precisely when a beneficiary may need them most.

A trust saying “distribute one-half at age 30” leaves considerably less room for judgment than one saying the trustee may distribute funds according to an appropriate discretionary standard.

The Slayer Rule Is the Backstop

California, like other states, provides that someone who feloniously and intentionally kills another person cannot benefit financially from the victim’s death.

Importantly, this is not necessarily dependent upon a criminal conviction. Probate proceedings operate under different rules and standards from criminal prosecutions. The criminal presumption of innocence does not automatically require a trustee to write a check while the issue is being litigated.

That leaves the trustee in an unenviable position: distribute the money now and potentially never recover it, or hold it and risk depriving an innocent beneficiary of money to which he may already be legally entitled. There is no comfortable choice.

Could Better Drafting Have Helped?

Perhaps. Most estate plans do not need a paragraph entitled “What Happens If My Child Is Accused of Murdering Me?” But many clients have much more ordinary concerns about beneficiaries: addiction, creditors, divorce, lawsuits, financial irresponsibility, manipulation or simply bad judgment.

Rather than requiring outright distributions at a certain age, a trust can potentially provide for payments in the discretion of the trustee, selecting professional or independent trustees, and giving a trust protector broad powers to amend the trust.

The goal is not to predict every catastrophe. No lawyer can. The goal is to draft enough flexibility into the trust so that when life produces something the client never imagined, the trustee has better choices than “pay it” or “call a judge.”

The Estate-Planning Lesson

The Reiner case is sensational. The lesson isn’t. A revocable trust gives the grantor control while the grantor is alive. What protects the family afterward is not the word revocable. It is the quality of the provisions that becomes irrevocable when the grantor dies.

Sometimes the most important question in drafting a trust isn’t: “When should my child get the money?” It is: “What if, my child should not get the money at all?”

For more information about estate planning, contact Evan Krame at evan@kramelaw.com.