Nick Reiner denied access to $1.5M trust fund amid parents Rob and Michele Reiner's murder case
LOS ANGELES CALIFORNIA: Nick Reiner’s request to access money from his trust fund to cover court fees and commissary costs has been opposed by the incoming and previous fiduciaries overseeing the trust, citing California’s “slayer statute.”
The 32-year-old is accused of murdering his parents, Rob Reiner and Michele Singer Reiner, and filed a petition in California court in June seeking access to the fund, which he claims is worth more than $1.5 million.
Nick Reiner’s bid to access trust fund money
Nick claims the trust was established in his name by his parents in 1993, following his birth that year. In his initial petition, he claimed he had not received the mandatory distribution of one-half of the trust that he should have received when he turned 30.
He requested that the first half of the trust payment be released to cover legal expenses and fund his commissary account for “basic necessities” such as socks and hygiene products. The previous and incoming fiduciaries, Paul Kanin and Jodi Pais Montgomery, opposed his request in court papers filed in early August.
They cited California’s “slayer statute,” which prevents individuals from inheriting money or property, including trusts, from someone they “feloniously and intentionally” kill.
In court papers obtained by PEOPLE, Montgomery prevented Nick from accessing money from the decades-old trust, stating that the criminal proceedings will ultimately determine the fate of the trust fund. The incoming fiduciary maintains that “no distribution should be made until the Court resolves whether” the slayer statute should affect Nick’s entitlement.
“The money in Nick’s trust would be passed to Rob and Michele’s two other children, Jake and Romy,” according to a previous court filing. Lauriann Wright, a lawyer for Montgomery, also wrote, “California has enacted no exception permitting a killer’s inheritance to be used for criminal-defense costs.”
Montgomery has a fiduciary responsibility to Nick’s siblings, Wright wrote, arguing that releasing the money would be an “irreversible” move. The new filing also states, “Nick’s sense of urgency is real, but it did not arise in a vacuum. It arises from the deaths of his parents, the very settlors of the Trust at issue, and Nick is presently accused of causing those deaths.”
LA County grand jury indicts Nick Reiner on murder charges in the killings of his parents
Nick disputed the withholding of the trust money in court documents, stating, “I did not give my consent to any Trustee of my Trust to withhold, defer, or retain my Age-30 Distribution indefinitely as ‘property of the Trust.’”
He also stated, “I have never understood anything I did (or did not do) to constitute giving the Trustee my consent to indefinitely withhold my Age-30 Distribution from me and retain it as property of the Trust even after I have asked for it,” adding, “and it was not my intention to consent to that.”
When asked for further comment on August 5, Wright referred to the recent filing, saying, “We do not [have a statement]. Our Petition for Instructions was comprehensive and says it all!”
Rob Reiner and Nick Reiner attend AOL Build Speaker Series at AOL Studios in New York on May 4, 2016, in New York City (Laura Cavanaugh/FilmMagic)His attorney, Anita P Wu, told the Times, “The slayer statute requires a determination, not a mere accusation. Nick is presumed innocent and has been convicted of nothing.” Nick is currently behind bars at the Twin Towers Correctional Facility in Los Angeles.
He was recently indicted on murder charges connected to the December 2025 killings of his parents. In July, a Los Angeles County grand jury returned an indictment charging him with two counts of first-degree murder, replacing the original murder counts filed against him last year, to which he previously pleaded not guilty.
