Peoples Law School Publication "A Death in Your Family"

I have come across a good booklet from the Peoples Law School of British Columbia called "A Death in Your Family: Practical Considerations on the Death of a Loved One." There are also Chinese and Punjabi language versions of this booklet. It covers some very basic things you may need to do soon after a family member has died. The contents are as follows:

1. What to Do First .................................2
What are the Immediate Details Around
a Death? ..................................................... 2
What is a Medical Certificate of Death? ....... 4
When Might a Coroner be Involved? ........... 4
What Information Does the Funeral
Home Need Right Away? .......................... 6
What is Involved in the Death
Registration? ............................................. 6
What Do I Need to Know about Death
Certificates? ............................................... 6
How Can I Get Information about the
Cause of Death? ........................................ 7
What is a Disposition Permit? ...................... 7
Whom Do I Need to Notify of the Death? ... 7
What if the Loved One Wished to Donate
Organs and Tissue? ................................... 8
2. Making the Funeral Arrangements ..9
What if I Need More Information or Have
a Complaint? ........................................... 11
3. What to Do about Your Loved
One’s Daily Affairs ............................12
What Do I Need to Know about Benefits
for Survivors? .......................................... 13
What Do I Need to Know about
Re-Arranging My Own Legal Affairs? .... 14
4. Where to Find Support During
Bereavement ......................................14
5. Resources ...........................................16
Information about Legal and Medical
Matters .................................................... 16
Information about Benefits ......................... 17
Information about Burial and Cremation .. 19

My one complaint is that in the "Information about Legal and Medical Matters" section there is contact information for do-it-yourself probate kits and notaries public, but there is no contact information for resources for finding lawyers. I am not a big fan of do-it-yourself probate kits, mainly because people who use them instead of lawyers are not getting the legal advice often required to protect the estate and do a good job. In British Columbia, you can go to a notary public to swear an affidavit in support of your probate application, but notaries public are not otherwise authorized to handle the legal work on probate matters or give legal advice on estates.

You can get contact information on lawyers who practice wills and estate law through the Canadian Bar Association, British Columbia Branch, Lawyer Referral Service.

What Not to Buy at an Estate Auction

Here is a story from a local internet news site Castanet here in Kelowna, B.C. :

It stands about 23 centimetres high, has two dolphins and a turtle on it and needs to be returned to its rightful owner.

Kelowna RCMP are in possession of an urn that contains human ashes.

A Kelowna woman purchased the urn at an auction about two months ago. She thought it was an ornament and opened the bottom place to check for a serial number. Instead, the woman found a plastic bag containing human ashes.

Who Decides What Happens to Our Remains?

Not all estate disputes are about money and property. What happens when the family cannot agree on what to do with great-grandad's remains?

In British Columbia, the Cremation, Interment and Funeral Services Act, S.B.C. 2004, c. 35, section 5, sets out who has the right to control the disposition of the remains of a deceased person by setting out an order of priority.

If the deceased person named an executor in his or her will, it is the executor who has the highest priority, and he or she may direct that the remains be buried or cremated, and where they will be kept. If the deceased does not have an executor, then the deceased’s married spouse or a person who was living with the deceased in a marriage-like relationship, including a marriage-like relationship between persons of the same gender, has the right to make these decisions. The legislation then gives priority to the nearest relatives in the following order: an adult child, an adult grandchild, the guardian (if the deceased is a minor), a parent, an adult brother or sister, an adult nephew or niece, an adult next of kin. If there are two or more people of equal rank, such as two children, then the eldest has priority. If a person with priority is not available or unwilling to give instructions, then the right to control the disposition of the remains passes to next person with priority.

The person with the right to control the disposition of the remains is required to carry out the deceased’s preferences as expressed in the deceased's will or preneed cemetery or funeral services contract, as long as compliance with the preference is consistent with the Human Tissue Gift Act, and would not be unreasonable or impracticable or cause hardship (section 6).

The person with the right to control the disposition of human remains should not exercise that right capriciously, and the courts can order that the remains be disinterred in appropriate circumstances. Take a case decided a few years ago in Kamloops, B.C. , called Popp v. Popp, 2001 BCSC 183. In Popp, the deceased’s husband had an urn with the deceased’s cremated remains buried in a plot designated for the husband’s parents. The husband stated that when his father died he intended to have the urn removed so that his father could be buried there. He did not say what he would do with the urn. Several other family members, including a son and siblings, wanted the deceased’s remains disinterred, and inured in a columbarium at Hillside Cemetery in Kamloops. There was evidence that the deceased had said that she did not like the dark and did not want to be buried in the cold ground. The court ruled that the husband was acting capriciously, and that the remains should moved to the columbarium as the other family members requested.