[mstade]

It definitely did. I feel for OP – my family has also had its issues with money. Particularly money grabbing individuals who don't mind walking over bodies, family or otherwise, to get what they perceive as "theirs" by some metric. Whether or not these people are technically correct doesn't really matter when in the end, people who truly used to love each other are now sworn enemies. Cliché as it may be, it's very sad to see and be close to.

[soneca]

My mother's family went through the same dispute over my grandparents' real state and destroyed the family. Keep in mind that it is a lower middle class family in a developing country (Brazil), not that much money. One of the most vicious aunts in the dispute had actually the same or more wealth than my grandparents.

Money has a way of being the perfect "excuse" for vicious people to expose their viciousness.

[mstade]

My case isn't very different from yours, except we're in a well off country and individually pretty well off also. Goes to show vicious greed isn't necessarily a class thing.

In my case, a certain person did things so despicable that in my view until they atone for their crimes (actual crimes, not just wrongdoings) in prison, I will never be able to even start forgiving them. Instead, they're living the high life. It's very sad.

I hope you and your family are ok, if nothing else the ones you still care for. These episodes in my life have certainly made me appreciate my immediate family in a different and stronger way.

[soneca]

At the end it was for the better (except for my mom's and grandmother's - when she was alive - deep suffering of course). We divorced from the vicious part of the family, no contact at all with a few aunts and cousins, my parents fortunately could afford to give up of their part of the inheritance and it was totally worth to buy our freedom of any need for future contact with them.

For me, it was a lesson that absurd unethical behavior within a family happens in real life, it is not a thing of soap opera.

Fortunately, there was no crime committed in my case. "Only" obnoxious behavior, greed, and extreme selfishness.

[NumberCruncher]

Humans do not need an "excuse" for being vicious. Viciousness is a part of our nature. If the game involves sex, power or money your fellow humans will show their real nature.