Gay Model's $25M Estate in Limbo Because She Could Never Marry Her Partner - DNAinfo
Gigi Carrier Cowell (center) was adopted by her lover, Shirley Cowell (white blazer), for inheritance purposes. Both have since died, but the adoption has led to a legal complication where their $25 million will likely languish in an unclaimed fund with the state of New York. NEW YORK CITY — The $25 million estate of a late lesbian model and actress may languish in permanent limbo, collecting dust in an unclaimed funds account controlled by the city — all because she was never able to legally marry her longtime... Fashion model Gigi Carrier and her wealthy socialite lover, Shirley Ione Cowell, were in a long-term romance decades before same-sex marriage was legalized. In 1971, while living in Florida, Cowell, then 57, legally adopted Carrier, then 41, as her daughter. But when Carrier died at 71 in 2009, her adoption led to an unprecedented legal quagmire — one that's stymieing her own brother from inheriting her $25 million estate. Carrier’s biological brother, Leonard Carrier, said that since she had no children and no living. Source: www.dnainfo.com
