Thompson Estate Showdown On Hold?

By Walter F. Roche Jr.

The widow of former U.S. Sen. Fred Thompson has asked a probate judge to cancel a scheduled hearing on her motion to dismiss the claims of two of the former presidential candidate's sons.
In a brief motion filed this week Jeri Thompson asked that her motion for summary judgment be removed from the docket for Sept. 29.
The motion is the latest development in the court battle over the one time presidential candidate's estate.
Thompson's two eldest sons have charged that Jeri Thompson made a last minute attempt to change her husband's estate plans at a time when he was not legally competent to authorize any changes.
Emails to Jeri Thompson's lawyer William T. Ramsey did not bring a response today.
Fred D. Thompson 2nd and Daniel L. Thompson, sons of Thompson and his first wife, leveled the charges after discovering a Nashville law firm had been working with Jeri Thompson in the weeks before Fred Thompson's death late last year on estate matters.
Details of the efforts were included in a billing statement filed by the Nashville firm of Waller Lansden Dortch and Davis in a $14,550 claim against the estate.
Jeri Thompson has disputed the law firm's claim, but a hearing on that matter also has been put on hold.
In another recent development the Waller firm has asked that the court block a subpoena of the firm's Thompson estate records.
Jeri Thompson,  the late television actor's second wife, has stated that the only change actually made in her husband's estate was inconsequential and involved adding a second secondary beneficiary to a life insurance policy.
According to a filing by her new attorneys, the life insurance policy named her as the primary beneficiary and it has already been cashed in.
Thompson, who died on Nov. 1, 2015, had two children with Jeri, but neither is mentioned in the decade-old will filed in his estate.
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