The battle over Zappos founder and former CEO Tony Hsieh’s fortune has taken a forensic turn after the shoe magnate’s death in a Connecticut house fire.
The former Zappos CEO was widely believed to have died without a will after he succumbed to injuries from a 2020 fire at age 46.
But a purported seven-page will, dated March 2015, suddenly arrived by mail at a Las Vegas courthouse last year, setting off a mystery that now sits at the center of his estate fight, The Wall Street Journal reported.
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The supposed will includes a no-contest clause aimed at Hsieh’s parents and two younger brothers. Under the terms of the document, if one family member challenged the will, all of them could be cut out.
Hsieh’s father, Richard Hsieh, has demanded a jury trial.
The document also landed at the office of Las Vegas trust attorney Robert Armstrong, who said he never met Hsieh despite being named as a co-executor in the alleged will, according to the Journal.
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A man who identified himself as Kashif Singh reportedly called Armstrong’s office and claimed he found the document among the belongings of his late grandfather. The office later received what appeared to be the grandfather’s death certificate from Balochistan, Pakistan, the Journal reported.
More than a year later, the origin of the document remains murky. The man who allegedly sent it has not appeared in court, the witnesses listed on the document have not come forward and Hsieh’s family has called the alleged will a scam.
Now, forensic experts are taking over.
A Las Vegas judge in May appointed forensic specialist Gerry LaPorte as a special master to oversee testing of the document. LaPorte’s team began examining the purported will in early June at the courthouse after shipping about 150 pounds of forensic gear from his Virginia lab to Nevada, according to court filings cited by the Journal.
The testing is focused largely on ink analysis, including the ink used on the signatures. The process could help determine whether the document is consistent with its stated 2015 date or whether the signatures were added much later.
Additional tests could include handwriting analysis, fingerprint scans and DNA examination, the Journal reported.
Hsieh’s family has hired its own forensic expert, Larry Stewart, a former U.S. Secret Service lab director and chief forensic scientist. Stewart has worked on major cases, including the Unabomber investigation and new investigations into the assassinations of Martin Luther King Jr. and President John F. Kennedy.
LaPorte is expected to submit a written report by July 24, after which the family’s experts can respond. Fox News Digital has reached out to Armstrong, Singh and the Hsieh family’s attorney, Dara Goldsmith, for comment.
