Artist News Legal

Court documents reveal Prince left no will, former lawyer denies drug misuse rumours

By Andy Malt | Published on Wednesday 27 April 2016

Prince’s sister Tyka Nelson has filed court papers petitioning for a special administrator to oversee his estate, according to Reuters. This is apparently due to the musician not preparing a will before he died last week.

As previously noted, it was not clear at the time of Prince’s death who would manage his estate, as he had no spouse or children to immediately take it on. She has requested a court appointed administrator to oversee her brother’s sizeable business interests (proposing Bremer Bank in Minnesota) while she asks to be appointed to probate his estate.

The exact size of the estate is not clear – estimates of up to $250 million have been made – though court documents show that he had $27 million in property.

It is the fate of his music that will be of most interest to many, and without a will to stipulate how this should be managed in his death, it is unclear what will now happen to it.

The musician very strictly controlled his recordings, of course, routinely forcing even Vine clips offline, and latterly keeping his catalogue off all streaming services other than Tidal. Whether an executor, possibly looking to maximise the income from the estate, would hold to these principals remains to be seen.

Meanwhile, Prince’s lawyer L Londell McMillan has disputed rumours that the musician had been treated for an overdose of prescription drugs shortly before his death, saying that he was “not on any drugs that would be any cause for concern”.

As previously reported, Prince’s private jet made an emergency landing while returning to Minnesota from shows in Atlanta earlier this month. Hours later he left hospital in Illinois and continued his journey. Less than a week later his body was found in a lift at his Paisley Park home.

TMZ subsequently reported, based on information from unnamed sources, that the emergency landing and hospital treatment came after the musician overdosed on pain medication Percocet. But McMillan told People that he spoke to Prince on the Sunday before he died and nothing seemed untoward: “He said he was doing perfect. He said, ‘OK, I’ll call you soon'”.

“People use medication”, he added, noting that Prince was a vegan and known for living a clean lifestyle. “The question is, are you on meds in a dangerous way? Everybody who knows Prince knows he wasn’t walking around drugged up. That’s foolish. No one ever saw Prince and said, ‘He looks high’. It wasn’t what he was about”.

It remains unclear exactly what caused Prince’s death, with the results of a post-mortem not expected for several weeks.