A probate court may remove a pro se personal representative who defies a court order to retain counsel and continues representing an estate or trust without a lawyer, the Third District Court of Appeal held on November 12, 2026, in Friedman v. In Re: Estate of Bonny L. Wax, et al., No. 3D25-2169, consolidated with Nos. 3D25-2166, 3D25-2167, and 3D25-2168, a ruling affirming the removal of a pro se personal representative and trustee for unauthorized self-representation. Chief Judge Scales wrote the opinion for a panel that also included Judges Lobree and Gooden.
The case
Kerrin Friedman appealed four orders removing her from her roles in her mother Bonny L. Wax’s estate and three related trusts: personal representative of the estate, and trustee of the Bobbi Ring Trust, the Adam Wax Trust, and the Credit Shelter Trust. The probate court had ordered Friedman, then proceeding pro se, to obtain counsel in the estate case within thirty days. She did not comply, and instead continued filing pro se not only in the estate case but in the Third DCA and in federal court. The probate court separately barred her from self-representation as trustee in the Adam Wax Trust case; she kept filing pro se there, and began doing so in the Bobbi Ring Trust and Credit Shelter Trust cases as well.
The removal
At a September 16, 2025 hearing, the probate court announced it would remove Friedman from all four positions for, among other things, her “unauthorized self-representation,” and it later entered the four removal orders consistent with that ruling. On appeal, Friedman argued the probate court lacked the statutory authority to remove her and that she was denied due process at the hearing.
Due process: notice plus a hearing
The Third DCA rejected the due process argument. Friedman “received notice of the September 16th hearing and, at the hearing, had an opportunity to be heard,” which the court held was all due process required under these circumstances.
The authority to remove a pro se personal representative
Florida Probate Rule 5.030(a) requires an estate’s personal representative to be represented by a Florida attorney unless the personal representative is the only interested person, and a probate court may remove a personal representative on its own motion under rule 5.440(a). The court also had statutory authority under section 733.504(3), Florida Statutes, to remove a personal representative for violating a court order, which Friedman did when she defied the order to retain counsel. For the trusts, Florida law bars a non-lawyer trustee from representing a trust’s interests in litigation, and section 736.0706(1) and (2)(a)-(b), Florida Statutes, gave the probate court statutory authority to remove Friedman as trustee for her continued, unauthorized practice of law.
What this does and does not mean
The court expressly did not reach the separate misconduct allegations the estate and two family members had raised against Friedman as trustee, holding that her unauthorized self-representation alone gave the probate court sufficient grounds to remove her from every position. The opinion is “not final until disposition of timely filed motion for rehearing.”
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Read the opinion (PDF): Download the opinion (PDF)
Source: Friedman v. In Re: Estate of Bonny L. Wax, et al., Nos. 3D25-2166, 3D25-2167, 3D25-2168 & 3D25-2169 (Fla. 3d DCA Nov. 12, 2026). This article is general information, not legal advice.