Hans Reiser Sued By Own Kids For $15 Million 265
New submitter haruchai writes "The Reiser kids, now aged 12 and 11, have had a lawsuit filed against the former Linux developer, inventor of ReiserFS and convicted murderer of the mother of his children, to the tune of $15 million. It's believed he may have hidden assets and a judgment is sought so a search for these can be conducted."
A judge denied requests that the kids testify or return to the U.S. for their own well-being.
Re:How is this tech/science/... related? (Score:3, Informative)
Reiser is the author of reiserfs. A filesystem in the linux kernel.
Re:Wouildn't his kids inherit his money anyway? (Score:5, Informative)
They're after hidden assets - which are going to be hard to claim after his death when no-one knows it exists (in a related note, I do sometimes wonder indeed what happens to such hidden Swiss bank accounts, where only the account holder knows of, when this person dies). They don't know whether he has any money, they think he does, and are trying to find that out.
Re:Wouildn't his kids inherit his money anyway? (Score:5, Informative)
Re:Children that sue? (Score:5, Informative)
I wonder who really initiated the suit. Not likely the kids: what do they know about money, at that age
The lawsuit was initiated by the children's grand mother (Nina Reisers mother) who is their legal guardian and with whom the children now live in Russia.
I don't pretend to know anything about her motives, but I don't see anything wrong with a grand mother trying to secure her grandchildren's future. Especially after all they have been through.
Re:"sued by own kids" (Score:2, Informative)
yes [yahoo.com]
Re:Wouildn't his kids inherit his money anyway? (Score:5, Informative)
I see. I know many countries have laws that stipulate that such unclaimed heritage goes to the government, which then can use it for the general good. Sounds very reasonable to me; better than having it go to the profit of some private business.
Re:Wouildn't his kids inherit his money anyway? (Score:5, Informative)
According to wired [wired.com], the lawyers are working pro bono on this.
Greetings From A Maniacal Free Software Fanatic! (Score:2, Informative)
And your point is?
"Mania" is no joke. A symptom of my own Bipolar-Type Schizoaffective Disorder, Mania is a euphoric state of mind that, while it can feel good, is very very dangerous. Manic people are extremely creative, but when manic, have no way of distinguishing really good ideas from really bad ones.
For example, a man with Bipolar Affective Disorder - Manic Depression - drank eighteen beers one day then knocked over a bank. He carried his loot across the street, sat under a bush then quietly waited for the police to arrive.
I pull stunts like that myself from time to time, but fortunately for me Mania is quite rare. I'm the opposite kind, in that I spend much of my life contemplating suicide.
Good Day.
Michael David Crawford [dulcineatech.com], who invites his critics to take a flying fuck at a rolling donut.
Yes, they did. (Score:5, Informative)
The only reason the bank protected peoples' money for many years in the first place, and why Switzerland draws so many international deposits, is because they have a long record of effective government, an independent legal system and bank controls. Moreover, given that most modern governments guarantee deposits up to a certain level (100k CHF in this case), much of the depository risk is borne by the government and ultimately the tax payer, not the bank. And the bank has already made its (legitimate) profit by having access to the principal to lend against for many years. But hey, when you can ignore those inconvenient facts to privatize profits while socializing the risk, you gotta do it, right?
The ego the size of the plamet. (Score:5, Informative)
It's five in the morning here and I am in no mood to be charitable.
The lawsuit was initiated by the children's grandmother. Their legal guardian. Her lawyers are working pro bono.
No fees. No slice of the pie. Got that?
Moving on.
Reiser is defending himself.
In a way, he is always defending himself. Reiser, it seems, can do no wrong.
He is the one who asked the judge to drag the kids into court.
"Why?" you ask.
What he wanted to do was to draw them into a grandiose scheme to promote his new and improved conspiracy theories and defense for the murder. The judge isn't playing along.
He claims his wife was abusing the kids, that she had Factitious disorder by proxy --- often referred to as Munchausen syndrome by proxy --- where a caregiver harms or even kills someone they are in charge of in order to gain sympathy and attention. During the 2008 trial, Reiser alluded to that as well, accusing his wife of having the disease when she wanted to get their son surgery for severe hearing loss.
In the unlawful death case, he now says why: ''I defended my children from harm.'' He added that, by murdering his wife, ''I stopped multiple felonies by doing so.''
In his papers, he accuses the courts, the prison system, county children's services, his trial attorneys and others of conspiring against him, during his murder trial and now in the civil case.
''There are extensive legal grounds under multiple arguments for defending an innocent child when the state will not, at the cost of a non-innocent party's life,'' Hans Reiser wrote.
Convicted of Murder, Linux Guru Hans Reiser Returns to Court to Fight Civil Suit [wired.com]
"Wired" has it all, in Reiser's own handwriting.
More.
The beginning of Monday's trial was marked by impatience from the judge and the children's legal team. The complaint against Reiser was originally filed in August 2008 by the children's maternal grandmother and legal guardian, Irina Sharanova. The case has been stalled as Reiser filed various motions to delay proceedings and claimed that he has not had adequate access to his legal documents while at Pleasant Valley State Prison in Coalinga.
''This trial has been pending for a really long time,'' said Judge Dennis Hayashi about the pretrial claims. ''I also made it clear that I'm not delaying this any further. ... We need to move on.''
Reiser, dressed in his orange prison uniform and appearing antsy at Hayashi's denials, has subpoenaed his children to appear in court.
They are living in Russia with Sharanova and are not expected at the trial, [Sharanova's attorney] said.
"I personally don't think it would do the children any good to come here and testify in this trial,"
"They'd have to relive what they went through as very young children."
Both of the children were at their father's house in the Montclair district when the killing is believed to have taken place.
Jury selection begins in Hans Reiser civil trial [mercurynews.com]