A daughter who claimed her brother had ‘poisoned’ her mother’s mind to cut her out of her £1.1million fortune has lost a court battle after a judge found she didn’t show sufficient ‘love and respect’.
Dervishe Halil, had moved to London from Cyprus with her husband in 1952. She died in 2021 at the age of 94, leaving behind an estate worth £1.1million.
Before her death, Mrs Halil’s daughter Aysel Gencay, 72, became embroiled in a rift with brother Dogan Halil, 74, after she accused him of taking possession of the basement at the family’s Islington home for his own benefit.
The argument led her to be removed from their mother Dervishe Halil’s million-pound estate when she died.
The mother had initially divided her will between her three children – also including another brother Attila – in October 2013.
But over the course of five years from 2013 to 2018, Mrs Halil changed her will three times, eventually leaving the entirety of her estate to her eldest son Dogan in 2018.
This led Aysel to sue her brother as executor of the estate, claiming her mother either must not have understood she was handing everything to Dogan or that it was the result of ‘undue influence’ from her oldest son.
But a judge threw out Aysel’s claims, ruling that Mrs Halil’s last will of 2018 is valid.
Ruling in Dogan’s favour, Judge Raeside said: ‘I reject the assertion that the deceased had any assistance from Dogan with her will. The evidence makes clear he was simply a dutiful son.’
Aysel Gencay, 72 (pictured) has lost a court battle with her older brother after she claimed he ‘poisoned’ their mother’s mind against her to cut her out of her will
Dogan Halil, 74 (pictured) was left the entirety of his mother’s £1.1million fortune after she left her two other children out of it
Aysel had accused him of ‘slicing off’ and taking possession of part of the family property for his own benefit.
During proceedings, the court heard Aysel was ‘perplexed’ when she received a handwritten letter from her mother in 2015 threatening to cut her out of her will unless she apologised and mended bridges with Dogan and showed her ‘love and respect’.
The letter to Aysel and her other brother, Attila, read: ‘Your actions have destroyed my life and home, your actions towards your brother Dogan are very bad and shameful – we saw nothing but goodness from Dogan to all of us.’
Three years later in 2018, Dervishe put her warning into effect when she drew up a new will disinheriting Aysel and Attila, also attaching a ‘side letter’ which declared: ‘Aysel and Attila – none of the conditions in the letter I sent three years ago were fulfilled. Unfortunately, nothing has changed.
‘You still do not talk to your brother Dogan, and you still do not show me love and respect. You destroyed my home and I deleted you from my will.’
Dervishe’s final 2018 will left her entire fortune to Dogan, prompting Aysel to sue him as executor of the estate.
Aysel’s lawyers argued that Dervishe either must not have properly understood that she was leaving everything to Dogan in her last will, or that it was the result of ‘undue influence’ from her oldest son.
Aysel claimed that her older brother ‘worked on’ their mother so that she ‘surrendered her judgment’, and pressured her to sign over her fortune, insisting that the two letters spelling out her mother’s reasons for disinheriting her were actually inspired by Dogan.
Pictured: the valuable family home in Islington. Aysel claims her brother Dogan Halil took possession of the basement at the property for his own benefit
Aysel’s lawyer, Peter John, argued that the will should be ruled invalid for want of knowledge or approval, by reason of undue influence or fraudulent calumny by Dogan.
Mr John said: ‘The deceased had always indicated that she would deal with her estate on the basis of equality – informed by her cultural and religious background and her consistent approach towards her children throughout their lives.
‘The deceased’s purported last will – the 2018 will – was, therefore, a shock to the claimant as the deceased’s only daughter, completely at odds with these statements, and also inconsistent with the relationship which she enjoyed with the deceased throughout her life.’
He argued that Mrs Halil would not have been able to compose the 2015 or 2018 letters ‘without significant assistance’ and the language used was ‘startlingly similar’ to that used by Dogan in his correspondences.
Aysel, who lives in Turkey, said she was always close to her mother and claimed that she would never have disinherited her, as this went against all custom and family expectations.
She claimed that she flew to visit her mother from her home in Istanbul multiple times a year during Mrs Halil’s final years, telling the judge: ‘I remained extremely close to my mother all my life.’
But in his judgment, Judge Mark Raeside KC said Aysel had become ‘fixated’ with trying to prove her brother was dishonest, when in fact he was a ‘dutiful son’ who had done his best for his ageing mother.
Aysel also remained convinced that Dogan had ‘fiddled’ her out of her share of lucrative real estate, accusing him of ‘slicing off’ the basement of the valuable family property in Packington Street, Islington, for his own benefit.
The judge said: ‘Aysel said that the side letters could only have come from Dogan, who was behind their untruthfulness.
‘But the side letters are clear in what they say,’ he added, rejecting Aysel’s ‘fraudulent calumny’ claim against Dogan.
‘Aysel was wrong in her approach. She became fixated on this matter and her conduct was fundamentally wrong.
‘There was no dishonesty by Dogan. Dogan wasn’t responsible for any suspicion and therefore the case should be dismissed.’
Aysel’s unfounded belief that Dogan had sliced her out of her share of the basement property had coloured her judgment over the years, the judge noted, adding that Dogan had no involvement in drafting his mother’s will or the letters.
Mrs Halil had attended her solicitor on her own, he said, and her lawyer recorded that she seemed mentally sharp and aware of what she was doing.
When asked to explain her reasons for cutting out her children other than Dogan, Mrs Halil told her solicitor they were ‘not visiting her and not showing any interest’, said the judge.
Ruling in Dogan’s favour, Judge Raeside said: ‘I reject the assertion that the deceased had any assistance from Dogan with her will. The evidence makes clear he was simply a dutiful son.
‘Both side letters were written in Turkish in the deceased’s hand, Dogan did not help her and had nothing whatever to do with them.’
He had only discovered the 2018 side letter accompanying his mother’s final will after her death, the court heard.
‘I consider the assertion that Dogan was dishonest in his dealings to be misplaced and incorrect,’ the judge continued.
‘He was not dishonest in any way, he always accounted correctly in respect of any accounts.
‘It was most upsetting and surprising that Aysel continued at trial to continue to make these allegations.’
Rejecting claims that Mrs Halil lacked full ‘testamentary capacity,’ he said that although she had dementia symptoms by 2020 she was of sound mind when she drafted her last will two years earlier.
