Prince, Picasso and 9 Celebrities Who Died Without a Will

After Aretha Franklin’s death in 2018, her family initially believed she had died without a will—an assumption that conflicted with the scale of her music catalog, royalties, real estate, personal belongings and other assets. The situation changed when a niece searched Franklin’s Detroit-area home and found handwritten papers dated 2010, followed later by another document from 2014. A Michigan jury ultimately ruled that the four-page 2014 document was her legal will, ending a five-year probate fight involving family members and Franklin’s four sons. The article then contrasts that outcome with Prince’s case: he died in April 2016 from an accidental fentanyl overdose without a will, leaving assets valued amid disputes from $82.3 million to $156.4 million, with rights later split between Primary Wave and family heirs’ representatives.