Riddle Beneficiaries Sing Different Tunes in Royalty Spat

0

Riddle Beneficiaries Sing Different Tunes in Royalty Spat

By AMANDA BRONSTAD

Staff Reporter

Long after their deaths, composer Nelson Riddle and his wife Naomi are embroiled in a money fight more often found in divorce proceedings.

Though the pair were married at the time of Riddle’s death in 1985, the trust he established one year earlier and the executor of Naomi Riddle’s estate are in court seeking custody of royalties on some of his compositions.

A three-judge panel in the 2nd Appellate District late last month found in favor of the trust and ordered the executor to turn over more than $117,000.

According to the ruling, the Riddle 1984 Trust divided the couple’s assets by music created before and after the marriage. Pre-marital music was separate property, while royalties from music written after his marriage was community property, the ruling says.

The Riddles were married in 1970, well into Nelson Riddle’s career as a composer and arranger for big band-era greats Tommy Dorsey, Frank Sinatra and Nat “King” Cole.

His television and movie career started in 1953, and included scoring “Ocean’s Eleven” in 1960, “Lolita” (1962), “The Man From U.N.C.L.E.” (1964), “Batman” (1966) and “The Great Gatsby” (1974), for which he won an Academy Award.

Riddle died in 1985 at age 64. His wife died three years later, leaving her estate in the hands of an executor, Pasadena attorney Edward Ezor, the ruling says.

The conflict arose when Warner Music Group and EMI Group, sent royalty checks to Ezor, the ruling says. When Riddle’s children from a previous marriage and City National Bank, trustee for the Riddle 1984 Trust, discovered Ezor had collected royalties on music written before the couple married, they asked him to return the money, the ruling says.

Ezor, in his response, said the “royalty payments were substantially attributable to (Nelson’s) efforts during marriage and, as such, constituted, to some extent, community property.”

After a lower court ordered the royalties be returned, Ezor appealed. The panel re-affirmed the order.

Leonard Unger, a partner at Levine & Unger representing the trust and City National Bank, declined comment.

Nate Kraut, a Los Angeles attorney representing Ezor, said he petitioned the appellate court to re-hear the case.

Kraut said the “separate property” status of the pre-marital assets changes when the assets’ value is enhanced during the marriage.

No posts to display