Q: Can I, sole beneficiary, take control of my Maryland GST from my still living dad due to breach of fiduciary duties?
I was not informed a GST with me as the only beneficiary, existed until my cousin recently lost her mother (my aunt), and she sent me the paperwork from the GST now that her and her brother are dissolving theirs(other half of the original trust).
I have severe health issues including a disability that makes... well everything hard.
I've been asking and looking for personal loans, gifts, family help, etc for literally over a decade and now from what I'm reading, I should have been granted the necessary funds for treatment and getting stable housing so I could continue to take care of myself from there.
My dad, the trustee, has never even mentioned the GST as an option to pay for medical treatments that would help or housing when my ex husband because abusive-if he does say he'll "think" about a request for financial assistance or just a loan, I'm told I need to make "reparations" to his wife who literally left me a voice-mail once telling me to "Just do it then" when i was suicidal.
A: A beneficiary of a trust has the right to obtain a copy of the trust and receive an accounting of the assets, to include investment performance of the assets and transactions in and out of the trust. Your starting point should be a written demand on the trustee for both of these things. Upon detailed review of the terms of the trust, you can ascertain whether the trustee has been acting in accordance with the terms and purposes of the trust. If there is mismanagement or wrongdoing, or a failure to carry out the terms and purposes of the trust, or the trustee refuses your right to receive a copy of the trust and an accounting of assets, you may petition to have the trustee removed and replaced, and a suit can be filed against the trustee to recover assets wrongfully withdrawn from the trust. Where the trust does not provide a clear method as to whom or how to appoint a successor trustee, the benecficaries (or in your case, you as the sole beneficiary) can designate the trustee. Whether you can dissolve the trust will require a different analysis and will depend on the trust terms, the assets remaining under trust, and many facts and circumstances not set forth in your question. Dissolution typically requires court action to achieve that result.
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