Washington Lawyer - January/February 2025 - 44

THE PRO BONO EFFECT
Probate Assistance Averts
a Family Home Foreclosure
By John Murph
W
ayne Cephas describes
his older sister's house
in the District's Kingman
Park neighborhood as
a family home. His siblings would
gather at Sylvia Cephas's home,
where their late mother also lived,
four times a week and play card
games. " We would play bid whist,
spades, and tonk ... or just hang
out and eat Mom's cooking, " he
says.
Not long after Sylvia died in May 2023, the
northeast D.C. home faced foreclosure, despite
Sylvia's will directing the house to be sold immediately
to prevent that from happening. Her
survivors were at risk of losing more than
$200,000 in equity.
Sylvia, who was unmarried and had no domestic
partner or children, left her sister, Valeria
C. Benton, in charge of representing her estate,
including the 960-square-foot townhouse
with an estimated value of $585,000. " [Sylvia]
was very meticulous about getting her affairs
in order, " Wayne Cephas says. " One of the
stipulations in the will was to keep the house
from going into foreclosure and that it be sold
immediately. Another stipulation was to take
care of any unnecessary bills that were lingering. "
However,
Benton failed to file a petition to
open probate and refused to cooperate with
other family beneficiaries in filing the petition,
court documents show. As a result, the remaining
$300,000 mortgage went unpaid since mid2023,
putting the home in foreclosure. According
to Cephas, Benton did file a copy of the will
44 WASHINGTON LAWYER
* JANUARY/FEBRUARY 2025
Wayne Cephas, standing outside the house of his late sister in northeast D.C., received pro bono assistance
to navigate the probate process.
with the clerk of D.C. Superior Court's Probate
Division in July 2023 and hired a realtor but
made no further efforts.
In June 2024, the realtor informed the Cephas
siblings that Benton did not want to sell the
property and was willing to let it go into foreclosure.
" Right after that, we got notice from
the bank saying that they were foreclosing on
the house, " Cephas recalls, prompting him to
file a petition for standard probate over his sister's
house and to be appointed the estate's
new personal representative.
" In doing this process I found out that I needed
a bond, " Cephas says. " And not being too familiar
with all the legal verbiage in all of the paperwork,
I also needed a lawyer. "
A COMPLICATED PROCESS
Retired and living on a fixed income, Cephas
wasn't in any position to hire a probate lawyer.
Fortunately, someone directed him to the
Probate Legal Assistance Network at Superior
Court, where he met Murray Scheel, managing
attorney for the new Future Planning & Probate
Program at the D.C. Bar Pro Bono Center.
Launched in early 2024, the program has assisted
more than 50 low-income D.C. residents
with estate planning needs such as drafting
wills, establishing powers of attorney, and navigating
the probate process.
Scheel says that Cephas needed to petition for
a standard probate, which is more complicated
than an ordinary abbreviated one. Oftentimes
John Murph

Washington Lawyer - January/February 2025

Table of Contents for the Digital Edition of Washington Lawyer - January/February 2025