Dallas Probate Litigation Practice Areas

Kreig LLC is a probate litigation firm, and this page covers the contested side of probate. That includes fights over wills, executors and trustees who haven’t done their jobs, estates too complicated to run on autopilot, and property the family can’t agree how to divide.

Contesting a Will in Dallas County

Lack of capacity and undue influence, the two-year deadline, and how a will contest is filed and tried in the Dallas County probate courts.

Removing an Executor in Dallas

Why a demand for an accounting usually comes first, the two removal statutes, and the complaints that don’t qualify as grounds for removal.

Breach of Fiduciary Duty

Self-dealing, commingling, unapproved fees, and the remedies that recover the money.

Contested Heirship

Who inherits when there’s no will, the attorney ad litem the court must appoint, and the Dallas courts’ preference for two disinterested witnesses.

Dependent Administration

How court supervision works, the steps for selling estate property, and the order in which creditors get paid.

Inherited Property Disputes

Partition, the buyout right for co-owners of heirs’ property, and selling a house out of a court-supervised estate.

Contested Guardianships

Opposing a guardianship application, limited guardianships, and removing a guardian.

Trust Litigation

Removing a trustee, demanding an accounting, modifying a trust, and why a trust dispute can often be heard in the same court as the estate.

Large and Complex Estates

Estates that include businesses, mineral interests, property in more than one county, or blended families.

The Dallas County Courts

Dallas County has three statutory probate courts under Texas Government Code Section 25.0591(d). All three are on the 7th floor at 600 Commerce Street.

• The Probate CourtJudge Julia R. Malveaux
  Associate Judge Mary Jayne McNeil George
  Suite 100
• Probate Court No. 2Judge Ingrid M. Warren
  Associate Judge Ryan Trobee
  (214) 653-7138
  Suite 200
• Probate Court No. 3Judge Margaret Jones-Johnson
  Associate Judge Tomi J. Shehan
  (214) 653-6166
  Suite 300

All three sit on the 7th floor of the George Allen Courts Building, 600 Commerce Street, Dallas, Texas 75202.

Under Local Rule 2.01(a), new cases are assigned to the three courts at random, except that mental illness cases go to Probate Court Number 3. Once an estate has a court, Local Rule 2.01(a)(4) generally sends related and ancillary proceedings to that same court, so the same judge hears the whole dispute.

Counties We Serve From Dallas

• Dallas
• Collin
• Denton
• Rockwall
• Kaufman
• Ellis

Kreig LLC also has offices in Houston, Fort Worth, Austin, San Antonio, El Paso and Corpus Christi, so we can handle an estate with property in several parts of Texas without bringing in other firms.

What We Do Not Handle

We don’t take uncontested probate, muniment of title, small estate affidavits, affidavits of heirship or simple wills. We also don’t do routine guardianship setup or annual guardianship reporting.

If one of those is what you need, we’ll tell you on the first call and point you to someone who handles it, so you don’t pay litigation rates for work that shouldn’t cost that much.

How We Work

1. A free first conversationYou’ll start with someone who screens the matter before an attorney spends time on it. We set it up that way to keep costs down for everyone.
2. We read the file before we give an opinionThat means the will, the deeds, the accounting and the court docket. We won’t give you an opinion until we’ve seen them.
3. We tell you if you shouldn’t fightSome claims aren’t worth what they’d cost to pursue, and some deadlines have already passed. You’re better off hearing that on the first day than at mediation.