FORT LAUDERDALE, Fla. — The complicated legal and financial troubles of missing Fort Lauderdale multimillionaire Guma Aguiar will be overseen by two prominent Fort Lauderdale lawyers: Thomas F. Panza and John P. "Jack" Seiler, who is also mayor of the city.
Aguiar's wife, Jamie Aguiar, is getting her legal team's choice — Panza — as conservator over non-trust assets in the U.S. and Israel.
Broward County Probate Judge Mark A. Speiser also Tuesday appointed Seiler as conservator ad litem over four lawsuits in New York, Florida and Israel that have already cost Aguiar more than $20 million to defend.
Ellen Aguiar had sought to be conservator of her son's fortune. After court, she said she will fight for what she said are her rights and responsibilities to him.
"It's not gonna happen," she said about getting pushed aside. "I have three documents that say that he trusted me, that he was asking for my help."
She says her son, who has struggled with mental health problems at times during his life, had chosen her as his pre-need guardian.
But Jamie Aguiar's lawyer said she and the couple's four children, age 10 months to 7 years, are the direct beneficiaries of the missing man.
"This idea that they intend to rely on a power of attorney that Mr. Aguiar signed while he was in a mental institution that he wasn't released from for another 45 or 60 days afterward is somehow a competent document to reflect his intent is something we intend to fight vigorously," said Jamie Aguiar's lawyer, Albert L. Frevola Jr.
Whether the validity of those documents will be the basis of another court fight is to be seen.
The legal battles are happening while the women's loved one, a 35-year-old investor and philanthropist, is considered missing by police, perhaps at sea.
Aguiar was last seen at 7 p.m. June 19 leaving his private Fort Lauderdale dock alone in his 31-foot fishing boat.
If Aguiar steered his vessel to the Atlantic Ocean, he likely encountered high waves and strong winds during a weather advisory for small craft.
The unmanned boat was found on Fort Lauderdale beach just after 1 a.m. June 20.
Before the U.S. Coast Guard had ended its ocean search, Ellen Aguiar filed to become conservator of Aguiar's $100 million fortune.
Jamie Aguiar counter-filed to maintain control of assets that include a $50 million trust managed by Northern Trust that provides income for the family. It also includes an estimated $40 million invested in Israel in at least 24 properties, an organic farm and partial ownership of professional sports teams, as well as the couple's $5 million Rio Vista Isles mansion and $1 million yacht.
By: Linda Trischitta, Sun Sentinel
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