Chadwick Boseman's Brothers Move to Remove His Widow From His Estate

Caption: Chadwick Boseman in 2016. Credit: Gage Skidmore, via Wikimedia Commons, CC BY-SA 2.0.

Nearly six years after Chadwick Boseman’s death, his brothers have gone to court against his widow. According to ABC News, Derrick and Kevin Boseman have petitioned a Los Angeles court to remove Taylor Simone Ledward as administrator of the actor’s estate and to hold her in contempt.

The move turns a private inheritance into a public dispute among the people closest to Boseman. The allegations belong to the brothers’ filing and have not been tested in court, and Ledward, according to ABC News, had not responded publicly to the claims as of the reporting.

The Order the Brothers Say Was Ignored

Boseman died without a will. Under California intestacy rules, Ledward received 50 percent of the estate and was appointed administrator, while the actor’s parents, Leroy and Carolyn Boseman, each inherited 25 percent.

The dispute centers on what happened next. According to ABC News, a Los Angeles court ordered Ledward on Oct. 4, 2022, to distribute the remaining half of the estate to Boseman’s parents. The brothers’ petition alleges that “nearly four years later, Respondent has still not distributed the estate, nor has she filed a petition for discharge with receipts as required.” Fortune reported the brothers were assigned their parents’ inheritance rights and described the estate’s resolution as stalled by “delays, poor communication and mismanagement.”

What They Are Asking the Court to Do

The petition seeks more than a distribution. According to ABC News, it asks the court to compel Ledward to show cause why she should not face contempt charges, to remove her as administrator, and to replace her with a professional fiduciary and forensic accountant, along with a complete accounting of the estate’s assets.

The brothers frame the delay in terms of their parents’ circumstances, alleging it “deprives Leroy and Carolyn of financial assets at a vulnerable age when such support is most critical.” That argument, that aging parents are being denied what a court already ordered them, sits at the emotional center of the filing.

A Marriage Measured in Days

The relationships in the dispute are complicated by timing. Boseman married Ledward six days before his death, according to Fortune, and died childless without a will. That sequence is what triggered the intestacy split in the first place, sending half the estate to a spouse of less than a week and the other half toward his parents.

Ledward, as surviving spouse, held first legal priority to administer the estate, and Fortune reported she waived her fee for serving in that role. The brothers’ petition does not dispute how the estate was divided so much as how it has been managed since the 2022 order.

An Answer Not Yet Given

Boseman died on Aug. 28, 2020, at age 43, from colon cancer, four years after a diagnosis he kept private while continuing to work. In 2020, his family stood together in grief. The current filing places two of his brothers on one side of a courtroom and his widow on the other.

What remains absent is Ledward’s account. Both ABC News and Fortune reported that she had not responded publicly to the allegations, and ABC News noted it had reached out to her representatives for comment. As surviving spouse she held first priority to administer the estate, and Fortune reported she waived her fee for the role, details that complicate any simple reading of the brothers’ filing.

Until she answers, the record contains one side of a family dispute, formally filed but not yet contested, over an estate that a court ordered settled almost four years ago.

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