Family of 60s icon Marianne Faithfull in £400k inheritance row sparked by ‘childhood grudge’
The singing grandson of 60s music icon Marianne Faithfull is caught up in a £400,000 court fight between her mother and her aunt; At the heart of this fight was a bitter childhood grudge and “distressing” delays in burying a body.
Oscar Dunbar, the grandson of Marianne Faithfull, whom Faithfull married in 1965, and artist John Dunbar, was drawn into the debate between his mother, the writer Carole Jahme (61), and his aunt Patricia Tonge (72), after the death of the two siblings’ biological mother in April 2022.
The “fiercely independent” Dorothy Jahme (Oscar’s other grandmother) has died aged 97, leaving behind an estate worth around £400,000, much of it at her home in Axminster, Devon.
Evacuated from the London Blitz during the Second World War, young Dorothy was a well-known local figure around Axminster, where she lived for over 40 years before her death.
But three years later, his estate, which was to be divided between his two daughters and their children, has yet to be distributed, with Carole and Patricia deadlocked over its management and Carole accused of “unreasonable hostility” towards her sister due to a childhood grudge.
The case has now reached the High Court of London and Patricia has successfully applied to have her younger sister removed as bailiff. Oscar, who the court heard had remained “in the background” throughout the dispute, was also removed from his role as co-manager.
Carole Jahme, the daughter-in-law of Marianne Faithfull through her marriage to Faithfull’s journalist son Nick Dunbar, started out as a trapeze artist and acrobat and went on to have a rich and varied career as a dancer, actor, TV producer and writer of science fact and fiction.
Marianne Faithfull died aged 78 in January last year, having enjoyed a stellar career as a teenage singing icon in the 1960s; during which she famously dated Mick Jagger and later struggled with drug addiction – an addiction she overcame to re-establish herself as an acclaimed singer once again in the 1980s.
Her grandson, Oscar Dunbar, 32, is the lead singer of the indie-rock band Khartoum and also collaborated with his grandmother on the song “Love Is” from her posthumous album “Burning Moonlight.”
Nathan Wells, attorney for Patricia and her daughter Samantha Tonge, said Carole had recently displayed “unreasonable hostility” towards Patricia, focusing on “an incident where she tied a plastic bag around her head” and raising false accusations of childhood cruelty.
“Patricia says there is no truth in this,” he added. Mr Wells also highlighted other behavior he claimed was inappropriate for her role as guardian, noting chronic delays to Dorothy’s funeral due to Carole’s insistence that paramedics should change her death certificate.
“Carole insisted that the cause of death be stated on the death certificate as Covid 19, not pneumonia and dementia, and said that the death certificate should be changed,” the lawyer said. “His opinion was that the funeral should not take place until the death certificate was changed.”
He explained that he did not believe that a funeral should be held until the cause of death was determined. “There was a four-month delay caused by his insistence that a change be made to the death certificate, which doesn’t appear to have changed anything.”
Moreover, the lawyer said that there were question marks regarding the transactions in Dorothy Lahme’s bank account at a time when Carole had power of attorney over her mother’s affairs, and therefore she might have a conflict of interest.
He told the court: “The plaintiffs have examined Dorothy’s statements, they have set out transactions that require some form of explanation and, looking at some of the payments on them, they do not appear to have been for the direct benefit of the deceased.”
“They appear to benefit either Carole or her family.” Some transactions on Dorothy’s account that “require explanation”, such as the payment for sunglasses, were made in Portugal in February 2019, when her mother was 94 and not in the habit of flying abroad.
Carole had also failed to “engage” Patricia and her daughter Samantha as joint executors of Dorothy’s will, preventing it from going into effect. He said both he and his son Oscar “withdrew from the management of the estate with no suggestion that they would re-engage.”
Mr Wells accepted that there was “no suggestion” that Oscar Dunbar was involved in the possible mismanagement of Dorothy’s bank account, but added: “The real concern with Mr Dunbar is his continued inaction as executor.”
After a two-hour hearing, Master Katherine McQuail agreed that there were grounds to remove the mother and son’s roles as guardians, but emphasized: “It is not my place to find out the facts or resolve disputes and wrongs.”
Commenting on Oscar Dunbar’s mandate, he said the singer did not object to his removal, adding: “As for her, it is clear that she has always considered herself a seat lower than her mother and aunt, and has not objected to his application for dismissal.”
But focusing on Carole Jahme, he told the court: “From all this it may be inferred that he has failed to properly and conscientiously carry out the management of this estate.”
Referring to Carole’s past handling of her mother’s finances, the judge added: “Although I make no findings, these matters do raise real questions and appear to lead to the making of a claim with a real prospect of success.”
At the end of the hearing, the judge removed Carole Jahme and her son from the will and ordered that a professional lawyer be appointed to take over their place.
