Silver magnate’s son sues siblings over will

SPOKANE — A son of the late Silver Valley mining magnate Harry Magnuson is suing three siblings for allegedly writing him out of their mother’s will and misusing money from the family’s trust account.

Harry Magnuson died in 2009 at age 85, leaving behind a large fortune in mining companies, banks, hotels and shopping malls throughout the Inland Northwest.

His widow, Colleen Magnuson, died in March, and now four of their five children are embroiled in litigation. Thomas Magnuson, the second-youngest, filed two lawsuits Thursday, in Spokane County Superior Court and U.S. District Court in Coeur d’Alene.

Thomas Magnuson, 58, is the founder of Magnuson Hotels. In the Spokane County suit, he alleges that his brother, Coeur d’Alene attorney John Magnuson, coerced their mother to revise her will in the years leading up to her death.

Her will was drafted in 2002 along with her husband’s, and both named all five of their children as primary beneficiaries. Her husband died in 2009, and in 2011 she signed a new will drafted by a notary who worked in John Magnuson’s law office.

The new will removed Thomas Magnuson as a beneficiary and granted more money to his four siblings. Another revision in 2013, signed by a beneficiary on Colleen Magnuson’s behalf, granted all art, jewelry, furniture, tools, cars and boats, among other belongings, to the other four children.