By Molly Moorhead, Times Staff Writer
Thursday, November 11, 2010
When 78-year-old Elizabeth Kennedy of Lutz died on April 1, 2007, her estate was left to four relatives.
Three of them never saw any inheritance.
This week authorities arrested the woman who was one of the beneficiaries and the legal representative of the estate: Elizabeth Benedetto, one of Kennedy's nieces. Her arrest reports say she owes tens of thousands of dollars to the estate and has willfully refused to pay.
Benedetto, 49, of Spring Lake, N.J., was charged with grand theft and contempt of court for not responding to a probate judge's order to repay the money and then missing a court hearing to explain why.
She remained in the Pasco County jail on Thursday, held without bail.
George Leicht, who is 59 and lives in Belleview, was married to another of Kennedy's nieces. He and his ex-wife were each entitled to a quarter of Kennedy's estate. Even after they divorced, he maintained a relationship with Kennedy, who lived in New York City for most of her life.
Her husband worked for the transit authority and she did odd jobs, including working at the Bronx Zoo, Leicht said. They retired to Florida, and Frank Kennedy died several years before his wife.
"When her husband passed away, she didn't know anything about banking," said Leicht, who is now remarried but was Kennedy's only family in Florida.
So he would drive the hour and a half down Interstate 75 a few times a month to help her with her bills and grocery shopping, he said. He took her to doctor appointments and helped her keep up her house on Debbie Lane in Lutz.
"Whenever she called, I would go," Leicht said.
In early 2007, she got sick with a respiratory illness and went downhill quickly. She died in a nursing home.
Court documents show Benedetto petitioned to be appointed the estate's representative. In her petition, she named the other beneficiaries, including her sister Cecelia, George Leicht's ex-wife.
But Leicht said Benedetto froze out everyone else. In March of 2008, records show, she sold Kennedy's house for $120,000. That June, Circuit Judge Walter Schafer ordered her to deposit $107,000 into a trust account. When she didn't, he ordered her to appear in court to explain herself. She failed to show up, documents say.
So this week, the judge signed an order to put her in jail.
Said Leicht: "I'm just really disappointed in her actions and how she went about everything. I offered to help her and she just took it upon herself … and took care of business without anybody knowing.
"I didn't think she would do something like that."
Molly Moorhead can be reached at moorhead@sptimes.com or (727) 869-6245.