Ex-head girl ‘faked teacher’s will to get
£4,200,000 estate’
© Provided by Metro The teacher’s family said the will was written up after she had a stroke
and was ‘delusional’ (Picture: Champion News)
A former head girl inherited her headmistress’s £4.2 million estate after the elderly woman
wrote a new will months before she died, a court heard.
Leigh Voysey, 42, denies fraudulently obtaining the sprawling Hertfordshire property —
once the private Barn School, which she attended from aged eight in 1987.
She said Maureen Renny had ‘always favoured her’ and that she ‘reconnected’ with her old
mentor by chance during the last three years of her life.
But Mrs Renny’s family accused Ms Voysey of faking the 2019 will, which was drawn up after
she had a stroke and was ‘delusional’.
Four months later, in January 2020, she died, aged 82.
A previous will from 2016 divided Hill House between cousins Gillian Ayre, Angela Eastwood
and Susan Vickers, and the children of Mrs Renny’s stepson.
In documents lodged with the High Court, mum-of-one Ms Voysey said she bonded with
her former head after visiting her as a carer and friend from 2016.
‘Mrs Renny remembered exactly who I was, even though it was 25 years since I’d left her
school,’ she said.
© Provided by Metro Leigh
Voysey, 42, claims teacher Maureen Renny always considered her a favourite (Picture:
Champion News)
© Provided by Metro Angela
Eastwood, cousin of the late Maureen Renny, stood to gain a percentage of the estate in the
previous will (Picture: Champion News)
‘After reconnecting, I visited Mrs Renny when I could… about three to four times a year.
‘During one of my visits, she asked me about The Barn, i.e. Hill House, and I said I loved it.
‘Mrs Renny said to me “I hope it never gets built on.”’
Ms Voysey said she wrote her ‘distant blood relatives’ out of her will because she feared
they would sell the old schoolhouse to developers.
But Kate Selway QC, for the family, said: ‘It is their case that the 2016 will was the deceased’s
last true will.
‘The 2019 will is invalid because it was procured by the claimant’s fraudulent conduct.’
She said Ms Voysey had ‘no ongoing acquaintance’ with Mrs Renny. She had ‘one lunchtime
shift’ as a carer in 2016 and ‘never visited [her] again’.
She added: ‘The deceased never signed the 2019 will. It was completed in the claimant’s
handwriting.’
The civil case continues.