Family feud: Millie Erceg flanked by her daughter, Vinka (left), and daughter-in-law, Lynette, at the funeral of her son Michael in 2005. Photo / Brett Phibbs.
Family feud: Millie Erceg flanked by her daughter, Vinka (left), and daughter-in-law, Lynette, at the funeral of her son Michael in 2005. Photo / Brett Phibbs.
The matriarch of the wealthy Erceg family has left most of her assets to her "black sheep" son and no money to her surviving daughter.
The will of Millie Erceg, who died in October, aged 87, serves as a final chapter in a bitter and prolonged family feud regarding anestimated $1.6 billion fortune.
Millie has left Ivan Erceg, a superyacht builder who went bankrupt in 2010, in control of her four family trusts and her assets, other than jewellery she has bequeathed to her other surviving child, Vinka, and grandchildren.
The vast bulk of the family's wealth came from the alcopop company of Ivan's brother Michael. Michael died in 2005 when a helicopter he was piloting crashed near Raglan.
He left two trusts which analysts estimated in 2006 were worth $1.2 billion with the control left to his widow Lynette Erceg.
The Papakura home that belonged to liquor baron Michael Erceg. Photo / Nigel Marple
Ivan received nothing from those trusts - despite being listed as a "discretionary" beneficiary according to court documents.
However, the court heard he had received $95m from his brother in the years before his death.
Ivan and his mother took the case all the way to the Supreme Court after the trusts were wound up in December 2010 - the same year Ivan was declared bankrupt.
They fought to be informed on how the money in these trusts was divvied up but the court ruled that disclosure was not in the interests of the beneficiaries as a whole.
In her will, dated April 2017, Millie makes clear that she intended the distribution of her possessions to be some redress of what she saw as an imbalance in the family wealth.
She believed her daughter Vinka and grandchildren were well looked after, whereas Ivan was not.
Millie and her late husband, Mijo, Croatian New Zealanders, operated Pacific vineyard in Te Atatū South.
In her will, she said she and her husband sold various properties to help the expansion of Michael's business in its early days. In 2017, the Erceg family was fifth on the National Business Review's Rich List with a fortune of $1.65 billion.
"This was on the express understanding that Michael would provide ongoing support to my husband and I, and our children (his siblings)," Millie said in her will.
"Following Michael's death, and by way of compromise of court proceedings that I initiated against my son's estate for further and better provision, my daughter-in-law, Lyn Erceg [Michael's widow], as principal beneficiary of his estate, settled $70 million from the estate on a trust, the Erceg Family Trust."
Millie said that Vinka and the grandchildren were well provided for by this trust but that it made no provision for Ivan.
"So I have endeavoured to redress this imbalance in a small way through my will. I also want to recognise the tremendous support, affection and care that Ivan has provided me during my latter years."
Jewellery left by the late Millie Erceg to her daughter, Vinka. Photos / Supplied
She chose "precious" items of jewellery for Vinka and the grandchildren "to reflect the special place that each have in my heart".
Millie died in Switzerland, where Ivan lives. Her body is understood to have been returned to New Zealand to comply with her wish to be buried at Waikumete Cemetery next to her husband.
Her will does not put a value on the assets she has left to Ivan but public records indicate she owned properties in Epsom and Te Atatū South.
She also directed that all debts owing to her trusts be forgiven.
Michael Erceg's alcopop company made him one of New Zealand's richest people. Photo / File
Michael's company, Independent Liquor, grew on the back of Ready to Drink (RTD) brands such as KGB, Woodstock and Vodka Cruisers, to become the country's biggest independently-owned liquor distributor.
It was sold for $1.5 billion to Japanese brewer Asahi in 2011.
During the legal battle, the Supreme Court was told that Ivan was given $95 million by his late brother in the years before he died.
At the time, Ivan had creditors from the failure of his Auckland superyacht building business, the now liquidated Sensation Yachts Ltd, and there appeared to be concerns about what might happen to money should it be distributed from Michael's trusts to him.
Ivan Erceg, at his company, Sensation Yachts, in Henderson, which went broke in 2010 owing millions of dollars. Photo / Doug Sherring
A source familiar with the litigation told the Herald On Sunday it was "bitter" and Ivan may have been viewed as the "black sheep" because his business had failed whereas Michael's made a fortune.
Comment was sought from Ivan, Vinka and Lynette Erceg.
Ivan was released from bankruptcy in 2014. He is listed as a co-owner of a property in Te Atatū Peninsula and another on the Hibiscus Coast.
He once owned a 3000 sq m property on the clifftop in Glendowie, overlooking Gentlemen's Bay, which he sold to his neighbour, New Zealand's richest man Graeme Hart.
At the time of her death, Millie Erceg was described as having lived her life with "grace, courage and determination".
Her will was among papers lodged with the Justice Ministry, making it a public document.
