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Bachelor millionaire’s £2m-plus fortune thrust into spotlight high court Disputes involving heir hunters, DNA testingand an exploration of his father’s “romantic life.”
McDonald Noel immigrated from trinidad He went to London in 1960 and died a rich man in 2018 at the age of 84.
He left an estate worth a total of £2.7 million, including a Kensington home worth £1.5 million.
With no children, no spouse, and no will, his millions were destined to flow into government coffers until heir hunters intervened.
Potential relatives were found in Britain and the Caribbean, but fierce disagreements have since erupted over who were the deceased’s true blood relatives.
Now, armed with the results of the DNA test, a senior official court Judges were asked to conduct a rare legal “kinship inquiry” and decide who should inherit.
Judge Katherine McQuail heard shop owner and property tycoon McDonald Noel died in London in April 2018 without leaving a will.
The potential size of his estate piqued the interest of heir hunters, who delved into Mr Noel’s family tree in Britain and the Caribbean in search of his closest living relatives, but instead discovered a tangled web of family trees.
Mr. Noel was born in 1934 in trinidad The child of Stanley Dorant and Neutrice Dorant, Neutrice already had another child, Stella, born the previous year.
Stanley, originally from BarbadosHe subsequently gave birth to another son, Francis, by a Barbadian Clementina Forde. After Neutrice’s death in 1938, Clementina Forde traveled to Trinidad to reunite with him, and the two married in 1939.
By the time Clementine moved and married Stanley, she already had two sons, Clyde and St. Clair, whose descendants now claim Stanley was their father as well, having fathered them during a visit to Stanley. Barbados Or before he left.
Francis’ son Shaka is now demanding a share of the millions, as is Stella’s son Gerald Burton, who says he could get the fortune if the court is convinced his mum Stella is also Stanley’s child, making her McDonald’s half-sister rather than half-sister.
But St. Clair’s children (represented by his daughter Desiree Dorante) and Clyde’s grandchildren (represented by his grandson Taylor Dorante) insist that they, too, are descendants of Stanley and should share in the McDonald’s fortune.
Daniel Burton, representing Desiree and her siblings, told the judge: “The romantic life of McDonald’s father Stanley is at the heart of the genealogical issues that arise in this case.”
Stanley was born in Barbados in 1906 and died in Trinidad in 1968.
Documentary records show that he traveled between Trinidad and Barbados and gave birth to children on each island.
“The issues before the court in this trial are how many children Stanley had, by whom and who they were.”
Hoopers Heir Hunters began searching for possible beneficiaries of McDonald’s estate.
“The outcome will determine whether Gerald is the sole beneficiary of the McDonald estate, or whether the other branches of the family – Shaka, Desiree and Taylor – join Gerald as beneficiaries under the rules of intestacy.”
He told the judge that documentary evidence showed Stanley and Clementine were from the same area and knew each other before he left Barbados for Trinidad.
“The court is invited to conclude that Clementina’s initial contact with Stanley in Barbados led to Clyde’s birth,” he said, adding that historical ship manifests showed Stanley visited Barbados seven months before St Clair’s birth.
“There is compelling evidence that Stanley is the father of St. Clair. It’s documentary evidence, witness evidence and DNA evidence,” he added, claiming the evidence “refutes Shaka’s suggestion that (Clementina) would have had two children with different partners and then immediately marry Stanley, thereby passing off the children as his.”
He told the judge: “Simply put, Clementine was not that type of person and she strived to be a good role model for her children. She had been in a relationship and married Stanley after giving birth to his first two children.”
“There is no credible alternative hypothesis that St. Clair’s father was anyone other than Stanley.”
He concluded: “The court is invited to make a finding of fact or direct the distribution of the McDonald’s estate on the basis that Stanley is the father of McDonald, Clyde, St. Clair and Francis.”
Aidan Briggs, representing Francis’ son Shaka, urged the judge to take a different view.
“There are only two children listed on the birth certificate as the father of Stanley Dorante: Macdonald and Francis,” he said.
“While it is possible that Stanley fathered other children, the evidence presented equally suggests that he was regarded as the ‘father’, or was ‘claimed’ as the father by Stella after his marriage to Clementina.
He said the judge should be cautious about accepting evidence about Clyde and St Clair’s beliefs about their ancestry, saying “the child clearly knew nothing about his conception”.
He told the judge that even if Stanley acted as the father of all the children, they should not be considered his.
He said Stanley lived in a society where extramarital relationships were common and there was a tendency “for mothers to ascribe paternity to men, particularly for financial reasons – this was known in the British Caribbean as ‘giving a man a jacket’.”
“It’s important not to apply middle-class English norms to the Caribbean,” he said.
“Courts should not fall into the trap of assuming that a person will behave in a particular way because during the same period there was a stigma attached to children born out of wedlock in the UK.”
He added: “The DNA evidence supports Stella and Francis’ claims and should encourage the court to reject Clyde and St Clair’s claims.
“The court must be satisfied that there is a possibility that Stanley had other children. It is the submission of the plaintiff (Shakar) that the court cannot be so satisfied on the evidence presented.”
A judge will rule on the case later.