In 1910 the Minnesota Supreme Court held that a widow who had been convicted of murdering her husband was entitled to take his homestead and personal property as his statutory heir. Gollnik v. Mengel, 112 Minn. 349, 128 N.W. 292 (1910). The probate court had set the property aside to her; the district court affirmed; the Supreme Court affirmed again. Justice O’Brien’s reasoning was not that the result was just. It was that the descent statute was clear:
We are now asked to add to a clear and unambiguous statute an exception, and, while the demand in this instance appeals to every normal person’s sense of justice, it would establish a rule of construction, the limitation of which no one could foresee.
Gollnik, 112 Minn. at 351.
The legislature eventually answered. Minnesota’s current answer is Minn. Stat. § 524.2-803, and it is one of the more carefully drafted forfeiture provisions in the probate code — which is exactly why practitioners misread it. Section 524.2-803 does not say the killer gets nothing. It says the estate passes as if the killer had predeceased the decedent. Those are very different instructions, and the difference decides who actually gets the money.
Does a killer forfeit everything under Minnesota law?
No. Section 524.2-803 removes the killer from the chain of distribution. It does not confiscate the killer’s own property, and it does not remove the killer’s descendants.
Paragraph (a) is the operative text:
(a) A surviving spouse, heir or devisee who feloniously and intentionally kills the decedent is not entitled to any benefits under the will or under this article, including an intestate share, an elective share, an omitted spouse’s or child’s share, homestead, exempt property, and a family allowance, and the estate of decedent passes as if the killer had predeceased the decedent. Property appointed by the will of the decedent to or for the benefit of the killer passes as if the killer had predeceased the decedent.
Minn. Stat. § 524.2-803(a) (emphasis added).
Read the structure. The bar runs to two things — benefits “under the will” and benefits “under this article,” meaning article 2 of chapter 524 — and then names six of them expressly: an intestate share, an elective share, an omitted spouse’s or child’s share, homestead, exempt property, and a family allowance. Then it supplies the mechanism: predecease.
If the killer is treated as predeceasing, who takes the killer’s share?
The people who would have taken if the killer really had died first. In many families that is the killer’s own children.
Two statutes do the work. In intestacy, Minn. Stat. § 524.2-103(1) sends the estate “to the decedent’s descendants by representation,” and § 524.2-106(b) divides the estate into shares for surviving children “and deceased children who left descendants who survive the decedent, each surviving child receiving one share and the share of each deceased child being divided among its descendants in the same manner.” A child who murders a parent is treated as a deceased child. That child’s descendants take the share.
Under a will, the result is even more explicit. Minnesota’s antilapse statute reaches, in terms, a devisee who is deemed to have predeceased:
If a devisee who is a grandparent or a lineal descendant of a grandparent of the testator is dead at the time of execution of the will, fails to survive the testator, or is treated as if the devisee predeceased the testator, the issue of the deceased devisee who survive the testator by 120 hours take in place of the deceased devisee.
Minn. Stat. § 524.2-603, subd. 1 (emphasis added).
“[O]r is treated as if the devisee predeceased the testator” is precisely the status § 524.2-803(a) confers on a killer. So a testator’s child who kills the testator, and who is named in the will, drops out — and the child’s own issue step into the devise, provided they survive the testator by 120 hours.
Two limits matter. First, § 524.2-603 applies only to a devisee who is a grandparent or a lineal descendant of a grandparent of the testator. A killer who is the surviving spouse ordinarily is not, so a spouse-killer’s devise does not pass to the spouse’s separate children by antilapse; it falls into the residue or passes under § 524.2-103. Second, § 524.2-603, subd. 2 provides that words of survivorship — “if he or she survives me,” a class gift “to my surviving children” — are “a sufficient indication of an intent contrary to the application of this section.” A will drafted with survivorship language produces a different answer than one drafted without it.
The practical upshot: nothing in Minnesota law strips a killer’s descendants of what they would otherwise inherit. If the objective is to keep the killer’s branch of the family out entirely, the statute will not do it, and the will has to say so.
What happens to property the killer and the victim owned jointly?
The joint tenancy is severed, the victim’s half goes to the victim’s estate — and the killer keeps the other half. Minnesota has a published decision squarely on this.
Paragraph (b) provides:
(b) Any joint tenant who feloniously and intentionally kills another joint tenant thereby effects a severance of the interest of the decedent so that the share of the decedent passes as the decedent’s property and the killer has no rights by survivorship. This provision applies to joint tenancies in real and personal property, joint accounts in banks, savings associations, credit unions and other institutions, and any other form of co-ownership with survivorship incidents.
Minn. Stat. § 524.2-803(b).
In Johnson v. Gray, 533 N.W.2d 57 (Minn. App. 1995), the husband was convicted of second-degree murder of his wife. They owned a homestead and other property in joint tenancy. The district court severed the joint tenancies, gave the estate an undivided one-half, and then imposed a constructive trust on the husband’s remaining one-half for the benefit of the wife’s heirs. The Court of Appeals reversed the constructive trust:
Minn.Stat. § 524.2-803(b) deprives the killer of the right to take the victim’s interest in the property by right of survivorship, but the statute does not require the killer to forfeit his own interest in the property outright or through imposition of a constructive trust.
Johnson, 533 N.W.2d at 62.
The court’s reasoning was that the killer gained nothing: before the killing he owned an undivided one-half and could sever the joint tenancy unilaterally at any time; after the killing he owned an undivided one-half without a right of survivorship. “Because Gray acquired no property as a result of his wife’s death, he was not enriched by her murder, and the district court improperly imposed a constructive trust on Gray’s interest in the jointly owned properties.” Id.
The estate argued that paragraph (b) should be read in light of paragraph (a)’s predecease rule, which would have carried the whole property to the estate. The court rejected that too, holding that the specific joint-tenancy provision controls over the general one. Id. at 63.
This is the single most consequential thing to know about § 524.2-803 in a real case. The killer’s half of the house is not recoverable under the slayer statute. Whether some independent equitable theory reaches it is a different question, and Johnson did not leave much room for one on those facts.
Was the rule different before the statute?
Yes, and the older cases still matter because they show what the statute was written to change and where it left seams.
Vesey v. Vesey, 237 Minn. 295, 54 N.W.2d 385 (1952), involved joint-and-several bank and savings accounts. The predecessor statute, Minn. Stat. § 525.87, barred a felonious killer from inheriting or taking “any interest in the estate of the decedent.” The court held that it did not reach the accounts at all, because the surviving depositor “takes not from the estate of the deceased joint owner but by virtue of the contract of deposit.” 237 Minn. at 299. The court then imposed a constructive trust as a matter of equity instead:
It does not interfere with any vested legal rights, yet it gives effect to the appealing doctrine that a person should not be permitted to profit by his own wrong.
Id. at 301.
That gap is now closed by the express reference to “joint accounts in banks, savings associations, credit unions and other institutions” in § 524.2-803(b) — but note what closing it accomplished. Under Vesey the whole account went to the estate. Under paragraph (b) and Johnson, severance leaves the killer a half. The statute made the outcome more predictable and, on these facts, more favorable to the killer than the equity the Supreme Court had fashioned. If you handle POD and multiple-party accounts, see also our discussion of POD and joint accounts under Minnesota law.
Do you need a criminal conviction?
No — but a final one ends the argument. Paragraph (f) sets two independent routes:
(f) A final judgment of conviction of felonious and intentional killing is conclusive for purposes of this section. In the absence of a conviction of felonious and intentional killing the court may determine by a preponderance of evidence whether the killing was felonious and intentional for purposes of this section.
Minn. Stat. § 524.2-803(f).
That structure has a long Minnesota pedigree. In Travelers Insurance Co. v. Thompson, 281 Minn. 547, 163 N.W.2d 289 (1968) — the civil sequel to the 1963 murder of Carol Thompson, in which the husband had bought nine term policies totaling $1,055,000 on his wife’s life — the Supreme Court held that a criminal conviction is conclusive in the later civil action over the insurance proceeds, notwithstanding the absence of mutuality of parties. The court described the authorities it followed as reflecting
a uniform wariness on the part of courts about permitting one whose guilt has been fully determined by proof beyond a reasonable doubt to embarrass the judicial process by prevailing in a subsequent civil action involving the same facts and thereby to profit from the crime for which he was convicted.
281 Minn. at 552–53. The opinion also confirms the historical arc: “It may be fairly assumed that the legislature intended to abrogate our holdings in Wellner v. Eckstein . . . and Gollnik v. Mengel.” Id. at 557.
Travelers construed § 525.87, the predecessor statute, which contained no conviction clause at all. The current statute codifies the conclusive effect in paragraph (f) and adds the preponderance alternative.
The finality question was litigated in Johnson v. Gray. The killer argued that his conviction was not a “final judgment of conviction” because his direct appeal was pending. The Court of Appeals agreed as to the moment of the summary judgment hearing, and held more generally that finality turns on whether direct appellate review of the conviction remains available, or on whether a postconviction proceeding is pending after a dismissal of the direct appeal for that purpose. 533 N.W.2d at 61. It also held that a conviction whose appeal was dismissed and remanded for postconviction proceedings is final unless the defendant actually files a postconviction petition before the estate’s motion to determine finality is heard. Id.
The court was candid about the cost of the alternative route. Proving the killing by a preponderance “can be met even though there has been no final judgment of conviction in a criminal proceeding, but meeting the requirement forces the estate to expend its resources on a trial and prevents the speedy and efficient resolution of the decedent’s estate.” Id. That is the real decision point for a personal representative: wait for the criminal case, or fund a civil trial.
What must a life insurer do once it has notice?
Stop paying. Paragraph (d) is the only part of § 524.2-803 that imposes an affirmative duty on a third party:
Upon receipt of written notice by the insurance company at its home office that the insured may have been intentionally and feloniously killed by one or more named beneficiaries . . . the insurance company shall, pending court order, withhold payment of the policy proceeds to all beneficiaries. In the event that the notice has not been received by the insurance company before payment of the policy proceeds, the insurance company shall be fully and finally discharged and released from any and all responsibility under the policy to the extent that the policy proceeds have been paid.
Minn. Stat. § 524.2-803(d).
Three features are worth flagging. The notice must be written and must reach the home office. The withholding applies “to all beneficiaries,” not just the suspect. And paragraph (d) reaches through entities: if the killer is a shareholder, partner, or beneficiary of a corporation, partnership, trust, or association that is the named beneficiary, the proceeds are held to the extent of the killer’s beneficial ownership.
Paragraph (d) then gives the beneficiary, the insurer, or any other claimant a district court action to compel payment, and authorizes the court to order proceeds paid “to any person equitably entitled thereto, including the deceased insured’s spouse, children, issue, parents, creditors or estate” — or into court pending final determination.
The general payor-protection rule in paragraph (g) works the same way: an insurance company, bank, or other obligor paying according to its policy or obligation “is not liable by reason of this section unless prior to payment it has received at its home office or principal address written notice of a claim under this section.” Paragraph (g) also protects a good-faith purchaser for value from the killer, while making the killer liable for the proceeds or value.
The lesson for anyone representing an estate or an alternate beneficiary is unglamorous and time-sensitive: get written notice to the home office, in writing, immediately, and keep proof of delivery. A federal policy adds a second layer of complexity — see life insurance beneficiary disputes and why the issuer matters.
What can be done while the criminal case is still pending?
This is the part of the statute most practitioners have never used, and it is the most recent. In 2013 the legislature added paragraphs (h) and (i) and retitled the section to add “EMERGENCY ORDER.” 2013 Minn. Laws ch. 94, § 1. The act carried no effective-date clause for that section, so it took effect August 1, 2013 under Minn. Stat. § 645.02.
Paragraph (h) is triggered by a charging document, not a conviction. Once “a complaint or indictment is issued charging a defendant in the felonious and intentional killing of the decedent,” a personal representative, special administrator, or interested person may file with the court a copy of the complaint or indictment plus an inventory of the decedent’s personal property that may be affected. The inventory expressly includes:
- personal property that is the subject of a specific devise under the will or a separate writing under Minn. Stat. § 524.2-513;
- exempt property under Minn. Stat. § 524.2-403;
- personal property claimed to have sentimental value to an eligible child under Minn. Stat. § 525.152; and
- any other personal property believed, in good faith, to belong to the decedent.
The filer must attest that the inventory is correct and complete to the best of the person’s knowledge.
Paragraph (i) supplies the relief. On motion and for good cause, the court may reserve a determination of distribution, hold property in trust or escrow for beneficiaries not disqualified, prohibit sale or removal or destruction of the property, permit a limited sale of jointly held property “only to the extent necessary for reasonable and ordinary living expenses” by the disqualified individual on court-approved terms, or grant “any other relief prescribed by the court.”
It can be obtained ex parte. If the court finds from affidavit or sworn testimony that the rights of the decedent’s heirs and beneficiaries may be irreparably harmed before a hearing can be held, it may issue the order without notice — but notice must then go to known interested persons within 48 hours, and the court must hold a hearing within five days. The order remains effective pending final determination under the section unless the court shortens it or rescinds it.
The same 2013 act closed the companion gap on who runs the estate in the meantime. Minn. Stat. § 524.3-614(1) now allows the registrar to appoint a special administrator informally “when necessary to protect the estate of a decedent due to circumstances described in section 524.2-803,” and § 524.3-614(2) allows a formal appointment without notice if “it appears to the court that an emergency exists or that section 524.2-803 may apply.” Minn. Stat. § 524.3-615(b) then lets the court bypass the executor named in the will: “In cases where the court determines a personal representative named in a will may not be entitled to benefits pursuant to section 524.2-803, the court may appoint a qualified neutral, professional fiduciary, or an interested person to serve as special administrator.”
Why that mattered enough to amend three statutes: the appointment-priority rules do not disqualify a killer. Minn. Stat. § 524.3-203(f) makes only two categories unqualified to serve as personal representative — a person under 18, and “a person whom the court finds unsuitable in formal proceedings.” A surviving spouse who is a devisee sits second in priority under § 524.3-203(a)(2), and § 524.3-203(b) provides that “[a]n objection to an appointment can be made only in formal proceedings.” Absent an objection, a charged-but-unconvicted killer can be appointed informally and take control of the estate’s property. Informal administration is the default in Minnesota; see informal versus formal probate.
Does Minnesota disinherit an abuser who did not kill?
Not by statute. This is a genuine and deliberate gap.
The tables of sections for chapter 524 (the Uniform Probate Code as adopted in Minnesota) and chapter 525 contain exactly one forfeiture provision keyed to the conduct of an heir or devisee, and it is § 524.2-803 — “EFFECT OF HOMICIDE.” There is no counterpart disqualifying a person who financially exploited, neglected, or physically abused the decedent. Minnesota criminalizes financial exploitation of a vulnerable adult and provides civil protective machinery, but those statutes do not operate as an inheritance bar in the way § 524.2-803 does.
Section 524.2-803 also says nothing about revoking a killer’s nomination as trustee, or about a killer’s interest as beneficiary of a revocable trust. Compare Minn. Stat. § 524.2-804, subd. 1, the revocation-on-dissolution statute, which reaches any revocable “disposition, beneficiary designation, or appointment of property made in a governing instrument,” any general or nongeneral power of appointment, and any “nomination in a governing instrument, nominating an individual’s former spouse or any members of the former spouse’s family . . . to serve in any fiduciary or representative capacity, including a personal representative, executor, trustee, conservator, agent, or guardian.” Section 524.2-803 has no comparable sweep. Its residual clause — paragraph (e), “Any other acquisition of property or interest by the killer shall be treated in accordance with the principles of this section” — is the only textual hook, and we could not retrieve a published Minnesota appellate decision applying paragraph (e) to a revocable trust interest.
That these two sections are the entire universe of automatic revocation in Minnesota is itself statutory. Minn. Stat. § 524.2-804, subd. 4: “No change of circumstances other than as described in this section and in section 524.2-803 effects a revocation.” Our companion piece on the divorce side is revocation by divorce under § 524.2-804.
Where this leaves the estate
Section 524.2-803 is best understood as three rules that happen to sit in one section, not one rule with subparts:
| Asset | What § 524.2-803 does | Where the killer’s own interest ends up |
|---|---|---|
| Probate estate, will or intestacy | Killer treated as predeceasing; § 524.2-803(a) | Passes to substitute takers, including the killer’s own descendants via § 524.2-603 or § 524.2-106 |
| Joint tenancy / joint account | Severance; killer loses survivorship only; § 524.2-803(b) | Killer retains an undivided interest as tenant in common (Johnson v. Gray) |
| Life insurance, bonds, contractual designations | Killer takes nothing; proceeds distributed by court order; § 524.2-803(c)–(d) | Payable as though the killer predeceased, or as the district court orders |
If you are on the estate’s side, the sequence is: written notice to every payor’s home office; a special administrator under §§ 524.3-614 and 524.3-615; the paragraph (h) inventory filing as soon as charges issue; a paragraph (i) order to freeze what can be moved; and a decision about whether to wait for a final judgment of conviction or to try the killing to a preponderance in probate court. If you are drafting, and the family situation makes a § 524.2-803 problem foreseeable, the antilapse and predecease defaults are the ones to override in the instrument — the statute will not do it for you. On the other end of the same problem, a beneficiary who simply does not want the property has a separate route; see disclaiming an inheritance in Minnesota, and for how a share moves when no will controls, Minnesota intestate succession.
Madgett Law, LLC
Madgett Law, LLC handles contested probate and estate litigation in Minnesota state courts — beneficiary designation disputes, joint-account and survivorship claims, life insurance interpleaders, special administrator appointments, and petitions under Minn. Stat. § 524.2-803 where a death is under criminal investigation. If you are a personal representative, a contingent beneficiary, or an insurer facing a claim of this kind, call 612-470-6529 or send us a message.
Sources: Minn. Stat. § 524.2-803 (2025) — para. (a) predecease rule and enumerated forfeitures; para. (b) joint tenancy and joint account severance; para. (c) bonds and other contractual arrangements; para. (d) life insurance, insurer’s duty to withhold on written notice at the home office, and the district court action; para. (e) residual clause; para. (f) conclusive effect of a final judgment of conviction and the preponderance alternative; para. (g) payor and purchaser protection; paras. (h)–(i) inventory filing on complaint or indictment and emergency order, ex parte issuance, 48-hour notice, five-day hearing. Minn. Stat. § 524.2-603, subd. 1 (antilapse; devisee “treated as if the devisee predeceased the testator”), subd. 2 (words of survivorship). Minn. Stat. § 524.2-103(1) and § 524.2-106(b) (intestate descendants by representation). Minn. Stat. § 524.2-804, subd. 1 (scope of revocation on dissolution), subd. 4 (no other change of circumstances effects a revocation). Minn. Stat. § 524.2-403 (exempt property), § 524.2-513 (separate writing), § 525.152, subd. 1 (definition of “eligible child” and “sentimental value”) — items listed in the § 524.2-803(h) inventory. Minn. Stat. § 524.3-203(a)–(b), (f) (appointment priority; objection only in formal proceedings; only two disqualifications). Minn. Stat. §§ 524.3-614, 524.3-615 (special administrator appointment and who may be appointed, as amended in 2013). 2013 Minn. Laws ch. 94, §§ 1–3 (adding paras. (h)–(i) and amending §§ 524.3-614 and 524.3-615). Minn. Stat. § 645.02 (August 1 default effective date). Gollnik v. Mengel, 112 Minn. 349, 128 N.W. 292 (1910), at 351 (heir convicted of murder may inherit under the descent statute as then written). Vesey v. Vesey, 237 Minn. 295, 54 N.W.2d 385 (1952), at 299 (predecessor § 525.87 did not reach a joint-and-several bank account), at 301 (constructive trust imposed in equity). Travelers Insurance Co. v. Thompson, 281 Minn. 547, 163 N.W.2d 289 (1968), at 552–53 (criminal conviction conclusive in the later civil action), at 557 (legislature intended to abrogate Wellner and Gollnik). Johnson v. Gray, 533 N.W.2d 57 (Minn. App. 1995), No. C7-94-2290, at 61 (meaning of “final judgment of conviction”; cost of the preponderance route), at 62 (severance leaves the killer’s one-half; no constructive trust), at 63 (specific paragraph (b) controls over general paragraph (a)). Statutory text retrieved from the Office of the Revisor of Statutes, revisor.mn.gov; session law retrieved from revisor.mn.gov/laws; case text retrieved from the Caselaw Access Project archive at static.case.law. This article is general legal information about Minnesota law. It is not legal advice, it does not create an attorney–client relationship, and no particular outcome is promised or implied.