Prentice, an infamous and cruel former foreign intelligence officer, recently turned 59, and realised they were closer to death rather than their birth – made all the more likely given their challenging lifestyle from their former ‘intelligence’ days. This startled him, and made him feel very old.

With this in mind, and having a young family, he felt it was necessary to put his affairs in order should anything happen to him. However, although his current family were young, Prentice also had a previous and grown up family with his former wife, Fatima. Hence, not wanting to cause pain to either of his families, Prentice created a number of nuanced wishes in his homemade, DIY will that he wrote with the help of a pound-shop will writing kit.

In his will, he made the following bequests:

1) “For a good number of my diaries to go to each of my 6 children. They have some cracking material in them, and I’m sure they’ll inspire them into becoming international bestselling authors. There are 472 volumes of my diaries. My faithful assistant, Baybars, will help with the distribution of the volumes between my children – he knows all my business;
2) For my three country cottages to be given to my three current and ex-wives; Stefania, Consuela, Fatima. Stefania, my current and regretful wife, will have first pick of the cottages, but I’m confident she will choose the one in Keswick. My first wife, Consuela, will have the second pick (I’m certain she will choose the one in Wetwang), and my second wife Fatima will receive the remaining property;
3) For my shares in RuskEnergi to go to Rush, who I have told what he should do with them.
4) My residuary estate is to go to my favourite donkey, Kellogg, to help fund the rest of his days. He is only 4 months old, but I’m sure he will live many a long year.”

The day after writing the first draft of his will, Prentice was out walking in the local woods, and came across three religious hermits, who had banded together to live separately to one another but to share resources. They had therefore set up the ‘Give us Silence’ charity to organise their affairs – problematically, though, they do actively seek to cull all owls they find in the woods due to their disturbing hooting. Prentice spoke to the hermits for several
hours, and it became clear that the 3 of them were running short of funds after a smear campaign by the “Strigiform Society”. To help their cause, and because Prentice had once been savagely attacked by an elf owl, he decided to also leave ‘Give us Silence’ some money in the final draft of his will.

Three months after writing the will, Prentice was diagnosed with batrachotixin poisoning, and only had a matter of days to live. He therefore asked Rush to come and visit him at his hospital bed. He informed Rush that he feared for his favourite daughter, Dragomira, as she ‘does not lead a very orthodox lifestyle – I fear she will be led astray and nothing good will happen to her’. He therefore asked that the dividends from the shares be used to fund her lifestyle and ‘push her towards to the light – away from dangerous men who will only cause her pain and injury’. Rush said nothing, for he was in a complex sexual entanglement with Dragomira and a trapeze artist from Belize. Prentice did not notice his silence, and instead just kept talking before falling asleep, and Rush then slipped away. Prentice died 3 days later from the poisoning.

Tragically, after being informed of Prentice’s death, and whilst on route to her ex-husband’s hospital bed to ensure he was dead, a panther got onboard the bus Consuela was travelling on an killed all the passengers.

In the will, both Rush and Stefania have been made executors.

A few further issues have also come to light after Prentice’s death. It transpires that 2 weeks before his death, whilst drunk on fermented kangaroo milk, Prentice had bought a country cottage – bringing his total number of cottages to 4. Moreover, following the discovery of accounting irregularities, RuskEnergi has been liquidated by its creditors. The residuary estate is worth £45,345,222

Advise both Rush and Stefania on the validity of Prentice’s bequests.

Word limit: 2,500

Deadline: 26th April

Details on the requirements of an opinion can be found on Blackboard, under the Assessments tab.