Trust dispute; The Estates & Protected Individuals Code (EPIC); Standing; “Interested persons” (MCL 700.1105(c)); MCL 700.1205(1)(a) & (b); MCR 5.125; “Child” (MCL 700.1103(h)); “Heir” (MCL 700.1104(p)); Res judicata; Applicability of Reich v State (Reich II); Temporary restraining order (TRO); Judgment of divorce (JOD)

Holding that petitioners were not “interested persons” under the EPIC and that res judicata barred their claims, the court affirmed the probate court’s order granting respondents summary disposition in this dispute over a trust. Petitioner-Haist “is the ex-wife of decedent Dennis Haist.” They were before the court in a divorce action when the decedent died. The court dismissed that appeal. Respondents and petitioner-Kuhl are the decedent’s daughters. Petitioners filed a combined complaint and petition requesting that respondents “be examined about trust property pursuant to MCL 700.1205(1), and trust assets that were improperly distributed and should be returned pursuant to MCL 700.391.” Haist contended she was “an interested person because she is a judgment creditor of the estate.” This claim was “based on her allegation that the decedent violated the terms of the TRO issued during the divorce proceedings. That claim was previously rejected by the circuit court” in an order that she unsuccessfully appealed to the court. Given that she “never filed an application for leave to appeal with the Michigan Supreme Court in” the divorce case, her “avenues for seeking appellate relief from that decision have been exhausted.” Kuhl asserted she was “an interested person because she is the decedent’s child and heir, as those terms are defined in EPIC.” The parties stipulated that she was an heir. But “any interest she had in the estate was foreclosed by provisions of the decedent’s [8/31/21] will, in which [he] specifically disinherited” her. The court added that this proceeding concerned “Haist’s recovery of assets she claims were due her under the terms of the JOD. Petitioners have not established that Kuhl has any financial interest in those assets.” As to the applicability of res judicata, the court rejected their argument that no final order was entered in the prior case due to the decedent’s death. The circuit court in that case “disposed of all of Haist’s claims because they lacked merit” and the court dismissed her appeal not because of the decedent’s death but because “Haist took no action within the time prescribed in MCR 2.202(A)(1) to substitute a proper party.” The court further noted that she “was a party to the prior litigation, and the issues presented in this case are the same issues she presented in the prior case.” It found that the probate court properly ruled that res judicata applied.