When the personal representative is stealing.

By Moshe B. Newman, Attorney · Published July 2026

Realizing that the person entrusted with your parent’s estate — often your own sibling — may be taking from it is one of the worst moments a family goes through. The instinct is either to explode or to wait and hope you’re wrong. Neither protects the estate. Michigan law gives beneficiaries real, fast-acting tools against a personal representative (PR) who is stealing, self-dealing, or bleeding an estate dry. Here is what those tools are and how they get used.

What theft from an estate actually looks like

Outright looting happens, but most estate theft is quieter:

• Estate bank withdrawals with no documented estate purpose, or “reimbursements” that keep growing;
• The house or car sold below market — to the PR, a friend, or a relative;
• Personal property (jewelry, tools, collections) that simply “isn’t there anymore”;
• The PR living rent-free in estate property or driving the decedent’s vehicle indefinitely;
• Estate money paying the PR’s personal bills, “loans” to themselves, or inflated fees;
• An inventory or accounting that is late, incomplete, or never comes — often paired with total silence toward beneficiaries (we cover that pattern in when an executor won’t communicate).

Any one of these can have an innocent explanation. A PR who refuses to give the explanation, in writing, with documents, is telling you something.

The legal foundation: a PR is a fiduciary, and the court has teeth

A personal representative is a fiduciary who must administer the estate for the benefit of the heirs and devisees — not for themselves. Using estate assets for personal benefit is a breach of fiduciary duty, and under MCL 700.3712 a PR is liable to interested persons for damage or loss caused by breach. The remedies statute, MCL 700.1308, lets the probate court, among other things:

• Compel the PR to perform their duties — including filing the inventory and a full accounting;
• Enjoin the PR from further breaches (stop a sale, freeze conduct);
• Surcharge the fiduciary — order them to redress the breach by paying money or restoring property;
• Appoint a special fiduciary to take possession of estate property and administer it while the dispute plays out;
• Reduce or deny the PR’s compensation;
• Void improper transactions, impose a constructive trust, and trace property wrongfully disposed of — meaning assets moved into other hands can still be pursued.

Removal: taking the keys away

Under MCL 700.3611, any interested person may petition to remove a PR for cause at any time. The court may remove a PR when removal is in the best interests of the estate, when the appointment was obtained by intentional misrepresentation of material facts, or when the PR disregarded a court order, became incapable of discharging the duties of office, mismanaged the estate, or failed to perform a duty of the office. Theft checks several of those boxes at once.

Two features of removal proceedings matter enormously in a stealing case:

1. The handcuffs go on at filing. Once the PR receives notice of the removal proceeding, the statute bars them from acting except to account, to correct maladministration, or to preserve the estate. The spending spree legally stops the day they’re served.
2. A neutral can take over immediately. The court can appoint a special fiduciary to hold the assets while the case is decided, so the outcome isn’t mooted by continued looting.

For a broader look at this process (it works similarly for trustees), see removing a trustee or personal representative in Michigan.

What about criminal charges?

Fiduciary theft can absolutely be a crime — embezzlement statutes reach agents and trustees, and where the taking started before death from a vulnerable adult (a depressingly common pattern: the future PR helps themselves under a power of attorney first), MCL 750.174a makes fraudulently obtaining or using a vulnerable adult’s money a crime with penalties that scale with the amount taken — up to 20 years’ imprisonment where $100,000 or more is involved. A police report or referral to the county prosecutor is sometimes appropriate.

But be clear-eyed about the division of labor: prosecutors decide whether to charge, on their timeline, and a conviction doesn’t automatically put money back in the estate. The probate court’s civil remedies — freeze, remove, surcharge, trace — are usually the faster route to actual recovery. The two tracks can run in parallel.

The playbook: what beneficiaries should do now

1. Preserve what you have. Save texts, emails, photos of property, names of witnesses. Don’t announce your suspicions to the PR — it accelerates the hiding.
2. Pull the court file. The estate’s probate file is largely public: has an inventory been filed? An accounting? Find your county’s court in our Michigan Probate Court Directory.
3. Demand records in writing. A written demand for the inventory and an accounting creates a record. If the PR ignores it, that refusal itself becomes evidence. (The same dynamic applies to trustees — see when a trustee won’t provide an accounting.)
4. Petition the probate court. Depending on the urgency: compel an accounting, suspend the PR, appoint a special fiduciary, remove the PR, and surcharge them for what’s missing. Courts take fiduciary theft seriously, but they act only when someone asks.
5. Move before distribution and dissipation. Recovering assets from a serving PR through the estate is far more effective than chasing spent money after the estate closes. Time is genuinely the enemy here.

How we approach these cases

Probate and trust litigation is the core of our practice, and fiduciary-misconduct cases are a large part of it. The first step is a free 20-minute screening call: what you’ve seen, what the court file shows, and which of the tools above fit your facts — including whether the suspicious documents themselves should be challenged (see contesting a will or trust in Michigan, since the person stealing from the estate is often also the person who produced the surprise will). If what looks like theft turns out to be sloppy-but-honest administration, we’ll tell you that too — it’s a much cheaper problem to fix.

Frequently asked questions

How do I prove a personal representative is stealing from the estate?

You don’t need proof to start — you need enough to justify demanding the records. The court can compel an inventory and accounting under MCL 700.1308, and discovery can reach bank statements, transfers, and sale documents. Missing assets and unexplained transfers tend to surface once the paper trail is compelled.

Can a personal representative go to jail for taking estate money?

Fiduciary theft can be prosecuted criminally, and where money was taken from a vulnerable adult before death, MCL 750.174a imposes penalties that scale with the amount — up to 20 years for $100,000 or more. Charging decisions belong to prosecutors, though; the probate court’s civil remedies are usually the faster path to recovering money.

Can the estate recover what the personal representative took?

The probate court can surcharge the fiduciary, void improper transactions, impose a constructive trust, trace wrongfully transferred property, and deny the PR’s compensation under MCL 700.1308. Recovery depends on the facts and on acting before assets disappear.

This article is general information about Michigan law, not legal advice, and does not create an attorney-client relationship. Statutes, deadlines, and dollar amounts change; figures current as of 2026. Outcomes depend on the facts of each case and are never guaranteed. If you suspect estate assets are being taken, contact us promptly — delay narrows your options.

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