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Shakespeare famously wrote, neither a borrower nor a lender be for loan OFT loses both itself and friend. Can money drive a wedge between organizations that are otherwise friendly? A legal dispute between the Freedom from Religion Foundation and American Atheists over a deceased donor's estate has finally been resolved.
The conflict began when Ronald Pelly's twenty twelve notarized trust allocated forty five percent of his estate to FFRF, but a twenty eighteen handwritten, unnotorized memo introduces changes that reduced FFRF's share and added American Atheists and Planned Parenthood as beneficiaries. Pelly's son, acting as trustee, used the twenty eighteen memo to redistribute funds, which led FFRF to sue for an accounting and to ensure the original donor's wishes were followed.
Despite tensions, all parties eventually settled, and each organization ended up receiving more money then expected due to a larger estate pool. FFRF stated their intent was never to harm fellow secular groups, but to uphold the donor's intent. Both organizations expressed relief and are now refocusing on their missions. The story is from The Friendly Atheist by haimont Meta, published on April eighth, twenty twenty five. So, Jonathan, I'd like to start with you today. This mess seems worse
than trying to untangle a spider web. Can you hash out some of the details for us?
Sure? And what occurred to me when I first read this article was that it was framed as a conflict when it was it was just a legal move to force the executor to disclose all the assets that were in the trust and in some other accounts that were supposed to be dispersed. And the reason for accepting and what the reason was for the executor accepting assigned memo that had not been notarized or officially entered into the
trust you will trust. And so since they hadn't gotten that information, they'd asked for it, they hadn't gotten it, they had to sue the And when you sue when there's a disbursement like this, when you sue the executor for information, you have to sue all the other participants in that trust and in that so that they are aware of what's going on. Otherwise, the legal proceedings are excluding them, and that's not since they're part of it,
they shouldn't be. So that's why they had the name American Atheists and Planned Parenthood and the Triple A, which is the Atheist Alliance of America, which was disenfranchised by that note, you know, and the so.
They were in the original will, but not.
In the origin not in the updated one, so and so that's you know, that was bad for them. But the slight of hand coming out of the executor produced that memo showing him and getting ten percent more of the estate and others significantly less, and the Triple A nothing at all, and Planned Parenthood gets forty percent and Robert the executor gets twenty percent and thus adding about eighty one thousand dollars to his pockets. To me, always seemed a little fishy. But they didn't. They didn't accuse
him of anything. They just said that the information was incomplete and that he had to give an accounting of all the accounts. And when he did do that, basically turned out that everybody mentioned in both documents made out, so they all got more than they would have if either one of them was just singlely done or together done.
That's because there was a larger pool of money than they were expecting.
There was more in the trust, and there was more in the fidelity account than the executor led on. So you know when they audited it. I guess when the court got hold of the actual bank statements, they figured it all out. And these things are very nuanced, they're very very hard to do. It's it's not an easy thing. I just want to say one last thing and then I'll bow out of this. And an a state lawyer
had the most telling quote. I spoke to one nonprofit lawyer who was shocked that the American Atheists believed that the money was already theirs when they were distributed. There was an initial distribution based on the memo, right, and based on the first The first one was from the trust and the second one was for the memo and the American Atheists who were in the second part, the
memo part. He said, I can't believe they groups don't touch legacy donations like that, no matter the amount, until all the legal concerns have been definitively taken care of, that's what and that takes time to settle. So rather than wait for all this to get out now. I guess they already spent some of it. But as it turned out, it was all good.
You know, they sound like this kind thing is fairly common and that in that, like you said, at the beginning there it was cast as if it were some kind of confrontational lawsuit, you know, with arguments in the court and so forth. But really it was mostly or at least the way that they're presenting it now. Of course, you know, we're not privy to all of the details of what was going on behind closed doors, but they're
kind of making it seem like it was. Really it's just a normal step in the normal process of adjudicating and making sure we have all of the information and and and if the executor wasn't being as forthcoming as as necessary, then you have to kind of compel them to share the information and so on. So it sounds like it was like a like just a you know, just a hoop that that had to be jump jumped through to kind of named.
Yeah, since they named the other atheist groups, right, one of them got a little butt hurt about it, But we couldn't do it otherwise. And I think once they understood that, they probably would have joined in the suit, you know, so it's like rain. But you know, so this was just I think the communication was off, right, right, And both sides said that the communication of the other person was off. So it did look like a little spat was going on, But I don't think it was
really serious. I think that they they eventually knew what happened, and we're happy with the settlement.
All right, Eli even very patient, And so I want to jump over to you here. So the groups involved have have said publicly that their biggest worry about this whole thing is that it might send the wrong message to the public about these organizations, about how they interact with each other, and also about their commitment to their common objectives. And so how do you think the religious community is going to present this to their members if at all?
Yeah, And I think it was a concern I had as well, because on the surface, it looks like, oh, you know, the.
F FRF is suing.
Suing this this dead person for more money that they didn't get her, you know, suing other atheist groups for more. And you can if you don't explain anything about the reality of the situation, you can frame it as if it's just kind of this petty, ugly, messy sort of back and forth. But as Jonathan pointed out, like it just it wasn't really that way. It was just sort of a legal necessity. And you know, through no fault of their own, a couple of groups received more money
than they were supposed to. And the one of the groups that got shorted was like, hey, something not right. That's not what that guy wanted his money to do after he died, and you're not respecting his wishes. So let's just do that and just kind of get this all worked out. The fact that justs like Jonathan said, the brother the deceased's brother was the executive of the estate, and he produced this unnotorized memo, which I think in
this context unnotorized should be synonymous with completely irrelevent. And this is this memo that says like, oh, you know, give you know, change all of this at the last minute, and by the way, give the executor more money. Right. I think I think it was kind of poorly. Uh, the court system I think that was supposed to handle this, I think should have flagged that. So I think it was.
Poorly Yeah, I mean, they didn't say in the in the article, whether or not anybody was actually accusing the executor of of doing anything, you know, on on toward or anything like that, or cheat, Yeah, cheating, I supposed to put it bluntly, but you know, we got to admit, there's plenty of room for a fishy smell to come
out of that. I mean, that's yeah, there's definitely some you know, some things that were not not necessarily above board happening there, whether it was intentional or not, right.
And I'm certainly speculating. I appreciate you, right, but yeah, it does it seems like it could be something strange afoot at the circle K.
Right, right, yeah, exactly.
Let's just back to Jonathan for for a second here, So, so do you think that this was a I mean, we've been talking about this already, so you know, we may have already answered this, but I was just curious
what your thoughts are. You know, do you think that the conflict was between the organizations themselves or was it between the organizations the executor or and this will add a new little twist, is it really kind of a problem with all of the groups involved, the organizations and the executor and maybe even the deceased, a conflict between that them as a as a as a single group and the way the government, you know, adjudicates this kind
of thing. I mean, there's there's a certain amount of legal procedures that need to be followed, and are we highlighting a flaw there or where do you think the real cause?
I mean is it?
Is it really just a breakdown in communication or was it a faulty system or what do you think is happening with that?
I think what caused it ultimately was the lack of discovery and the lack of getting the information on the trust fund and the Fidelity account and the other accounts, a detailed description of them, and with the balances and things like that, and what the balances were in that sort of thing, and for all the stuff that was supposed to be distributed. And I think his son was
involved in the trust but part of that. But it doesn't it doesn't matter because the executor had a fiduciary responsibility to produce that to the people who were getting the things, and if he just didn't know he was supposed to do it, they asked for it, he didn't give it to him. Then they felt like they had to go to court and put it in an official mandatory situation, and as a result, everybody got happy. But I think in the process they got a little disgruntled
about how it happened. But that's true because it wasn't a smooth process. But I could I can just say that I don't think they ever are a smooth process. So, you know, I think that everybody has that problem, you know, with but not everybody. Some of these things go smoothly. They still cost money and lawyers. They still still have to have a lawyer, you still have to go to probate, you still have to do all this stuff. It's going to be you know, and it's complicated. It's not an
easy process. It could be streamlined, especially if there's no contesting in anything, you know, you know, just if the executor can just give people what they need and there's said and done with, right, then there's.
Like that's what happened. That's what happened in the end.
I mean, they they the lawsuit didn't go through, it was not proceeded, and it was not you know, judged by a judge. It was just they came to an agreement and everybody was happy with it. And and you know, everyone went their separate ways.
I suppose it's possible that, like perhaps the executor was just, through no fault of their own, ill equipped to handle something like this, just made the wrong call. I was a little bit more like skeptical and malicious in my notes about it, But now that we talk about it, yeah, I think that's definitely a possibility.
That we saw.
I've been the executor.
I'm change right here live on the nonprofits. I do that all the time.
On the show, I was saying that, yeah, yeah, if you made me the executor of a complex uh million and a half or two million dollars, I would probably screw it up to.
Yeah, yeah, me too.
Even though I'm a math guy, I'm definitely not you know, figuring out all the jump through all the hoops kind of guy. And so yeah, I would definitely mess that up too, Eli, I want to stick with you for a second here. Jonathan was talking about all all of the expense that's involved in this. These organizations had to pay tens of thousands of dollars for their legal representation.
I mean we are talking about hundreds of thousands of dollars. Uh, you know, you know from the that's being awarded from the trust, and so clearly there was a one could
strike an attitude of investment towards that too. But do you think that, uh, this was a worthy battle, not just by a matter of dollars, but for you know, they taught the organization's release statements saying that they were concerned about the uh, the reputation of their organizations as an individual, as a as an individual organization or and also as part of a larger group of secular and
atheist organizations throughout the US. Do you think that they're that this kind of thing was was damaging to that to that reputation or could it have been avoided somehow or or or what?
What are your thoughts with that?
I think it certainly can be damaging because if you think about like, oh, like you know how many churches are like not even churches, villagies, like people do you see speaking out against planned parenthood? Right, and then when they want to if they're speaking to the right, like maybe not aware like the audience, and they're trying to garner the opposite of support for planned parent opposition to planned parenthood, they're like, well, even the Freedom from Religion
Foundation is suing planned parenthoods. So even secular people have reasons to hate planned parenthood, and they can twist it that way without explaining like, well, no, here's the reason Planned parent or Freedom of Religion named plant parenthood in a lawsuit. It hasn't nothing to do with anything that they did wrong. So I think it definitely it can be damaging. I think not to the actual relationships, but
to the perception of the relationships. And now all of a sudden, all they're turmoil in the atheist community because they're godless, because they sin, because they have orgies.
Wait, we do, no matter, where's my invitation.
I haven't been involved, but it certainly sounded like gentlemen, really really sounded like I wasn't telling the truth. And I said that that's really fun.
But you had all those signs lying right there. You know.
I don't know why that happened.
It's just.
Boy Eli slack with the with the admissions and the nonprofits. He's changing his mind and now he's revealing more than he means to you.
Right, it's that typical tell is looking down like this.
That's it, right, That's what they say, That's what the experts say.
Your pupils go.
A popular movie where a character talks about not knowing what to do with their hands. That's me with my eyeballs basically all.
The time, right, right, let's go with that. We'll go with that answer.
I think, Yeah, Jonathan, I wanted to ask you, is there anything that we can learn from this? I mean, and not just uh, lessons about how we should you know, portray ourselves or how we can protect ourselves from from this type of thing happening.
But what about we We we mentioned that.
Religious groups or or whomever might use this as an opportunity to bash the the atheist groups there, and we think, and I think we would agree that that would be an unfair bashing happening at this point?
Does it?
But does it give us warning as as atheists to be careful about how we characterize clashes between religious organizations? I mean, can we can we use this to make ourselves you know, better citizens and better uh, you know, people that are in a better position to judge the actions of others.
And that kind of thing.
Is there is there a word of warning in this kind of in this story somewhere?
I think so, I think the way you deal with these sorts of situations is with a dose of skepticism. When somebody says two people are fighting, uh, you know, if you really want to know if they are, you look into the details of it, and they will you know, the devils in the details if if the details of it say they're not really fighting. There's just a disagreement,
a minor disagreement about some sort of fact. You know, it's not it's not like a knockdown, drag out fight, or it is a knockdown, drag out fight, and these people are going tooth and nail. But you find out, you know, you use several sources, dig a little bit into it, get some there are people probably doing a pretty good job of reporting what's going on. There'll be quotes and things like that. Don't trust them, but you know, I have a lot of advice for that sort of thing.
But the idea is that in this case, we found out by two articles. I read two articles on this and uh, and from different sources, and we found out that this was amicably done and amicably settled. So it wasn't a big you know, it's not the big headline. You know, you'll always get the you know, f RFF sues the world. Well no, they you know they you know, they weren't actually suing most of them. They were only suing the executor to disclose ship, you know, so they
had to do it. Get over yourselves. Now, when two religious groups get going, we just have to be careful that we're not biasing our analysis of the situation because we want to see them fight, right right, you know, just don't do that. Take a look, you know, dig a little deeper, dig a little bit beyond the surface of what you're seeing and the sensational headlines, you know, because that's how they sell papers, as we used to say, but that's how they get clicks, you.
Know, yeah, exactly.
And and you know, we're atheists are human too, where we can jump on the bandwagon. You know, we see groups that we are opposed to seemingly doing things that.
Are bad or whatever.
You know, it's very easy to start pointing the finger. And so maybe this would be a you know, a dose of what it's like to experience that from from the other side. And you know, so it could be just a you know, a warning for us to just be wary and be be attentive and as you said, be a little bit skeptical, dig a little deeper. Uh, Eli, do you have anything to add to that?
Well?
I had the thought while John was saying it that you kind of helped me connect something. If the devil is in the details, Christians aren't going to go there.
They're going to stay away.
Wow, I think something there. I don't bother the right.
We have to we have to remember that the Christians are people.
Too, exactly.
Yeah, so we got to find a way to get the devil somewhere else? Can we put it in? Like, can we put them in the big in Georgia or the devil.
Put them beneath the keel of the boat and we're good.
Details in Georgia.
I have no comment on that.
Just be kind people, Just be kind, you know, in your dealings with people.
For sure.
I think that's a perfect spot for us to wrap this one up there, nice nice little cherry on top of that one.
Jonathan and I want to thank you.
Both for hanging in there with me this week, and we've had I think we've had some really good discussions.
Uh.
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