MANHATTAN — The teen twin heirs to Doris Duke’s staggering fortune have a wicked stepmom whose siphoning off funds set aside for their benefit, a new lawsuit charges.
Daralee Inman, the fifth and last wife of the 15-year-olds’ deceased dad, has been accused of pocketing $328,000 from a trust set up for them in Wyoming, according to a lawsuit filed in that state earlier this month.
A conservator for twins Georgia and Walker Patterson Inman is suing to have the step-mom removed as a trustee of the fund, which is valued at more than $8 million. The conservator, Wyoming Trust Company, claims when the teens’ dad, Walker Patterson Jr., died of a drug overdose in 2010, Daralee was named the executor of his estate.
Assets from the estate — including a 10,000-square-foot log and stone cabin in Wyoming, sacks of gold coins, valuable artwork and a million-dollar cache of collectible firearms — were supposed to fund the Wyoming trust for the children. But the lawsuit claims Daralee hasn’t made any distributions to the children – only to herself.
“To date, administration appears to have been for the sole benefit of Daralee Inman and counsel to the exclusion of Walker P. Inman Jr.’s minors, who are the stated beneficiaries of his trust,” the lawsuit says.
The teen heirs are the grandniece and grandnephew of Manhattan philanthropist Doris Duke. Their father — who before his death received $90,000 a month from his own trusts — once said in a court proceeding that they would be worth $1 billion when they turned 21.
The twins currently live with their mother, Daisha Inman, in Utah. For the past two years, she has been locked in a legal battle in Manhattan Surrogate’s Court with JPMorgan, the administrator of another trust for the teens.
JPMorgan accuses Inman of spending money from the $29 million trust on a lavish lifestyle and not providing adequate accounting of expenses.
The heirs lived with their dad and Daralee in Wyoming for three years before his death. Daisha subsequently gained custody.
The Wyoming lawsuit claims that Daralee has a felony conviction for drug possession. The teens also claim that she emotionally and physically abused them, according to the lawsuit.
Darelee could not be reached for comment.
The lawsuit also demands that a second trustee, Inman Jr.’s New Zealand friend Brett Armstrong, be removed from the Wyoming trust. A third trustee has already resigned.
