Judge postpones hearing on 'slayer statute' blocking Nick Reiner trust fund

Theresa Braine, New York Daily News on Aug 17, 2026

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A judge on Monday postponed a court hearing over whether a California law disqualifies Nick Reiner, accused of killing parents Rob and Michele Reiner, from accessing funds from a trust they set up when he was a baby.

Judge Ruben Garcia scheduled a hearing for Oct. 23, despite pressure from Reiner’s probate attorney, Anita Wu, to release at least some of the funds.

“It’s been delay after delay after delay,” Wu said, according to Variety. “The clock is really running on his preparation of his defense. This is not something that can continue to wait.”

Reiner has been jailed without bail since being arrested for the brutal stabbings in December. He is trying to dip into the $1.5 million trust fund his parents had set up in his infanthood so he can rehire private defense attorney Alan Jackson, who walked away from the case earlier this year for undisclosed reasons. It has since come out that Reiner’s older brother Jake and younger sister Romy had changed their minds about paying for their sibling’s defense, and he is now represented by a public defender.

Professional fiduciaries Paul Kanin and his successor, Jodi Montgomery, have opposed Reiner’s request, which he first filed in June at about the same time Montgomery took over from Kanin. In court filings they invoked California’s so-called slayer statute, which holds that “a person who feloniously and intentionally kills” someone is not entitled to “any property, interest or benefit,” including money from a trust.

Under the terms of the trust, which is separate from the family’s other holdings, Reiner was due about $558,000 when he turned 30, which was two years ago, and the balance when he turned 35. The fiduciaries have said that he opted not to take the first payout, leaving it in the fund, but Reiner refuted that in a recent court filing. Moreover, Wu argued, the presumption of innocence trumps the slayer statute, since Reiner has not been convicted in the Dec. 14, 2025, slayings. Reiner has pleaded not guilty to the murder charges and additional allegations that he lay in wait.

“The main thing to take away from today’s hearing and going forward is Nick Reiner is very much entitled to his own money, his own funds,” said Jackson, who also attended the hearing, according to CBS News. “He has made a determination that he wants to be able to use his funds that are in his trust account to decide on his criminal counsel.”

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