The legal battle over a Columbia man's $1.25 million bequest to the Lancaster Public Library is now in the hands of a judge.
Thomas Bucher, who died in July 2008 from a self-inflicted gunshot wound, left his estate to the library rather than his relatives.
Bucher's family members took the matter to court, arguing that the 59-year-old man was operating under an "insane delusion" when he revised his will and left everything to the library.
For two days this week, Senior Judge C. Joseph Rehkamp heard testimony in Lancaster County Court regarding Bucher's state of mind at the time the will was prepared.
Because Bucher was the son of retired Lancaster County Judge Wilson Bucher, Rehkamp, from Perry County, was assigned to decide the case.
After the proceeding is transcribed, attorneys on both sides of the case will prepare written legal arguments and submit them to the judge.
Rehkamp is expected to make a decision sometime early next year.
Attorney Steven R. Blair, who was Bucher's brother-in-law, is representing the family. Robert Hallinger, an attorney with the Lancaster law firm of Appel & Yost, is representing the library.
Joanne Coles, representing the state Attorney General's Charitable Trusts and Organizations Section, which reviews challenged wills, also participated in the proceeding.
The library and the state are opposed to overturning Bucher's will.
Among the witnesses who testified this week was Bruce Campbell, Bucher's supervisor at the county's adult probation office, where he was working at the time of his death.
Blair indicated that Bucher had been "diagnosed with signs of paranoid schizophrenia" in 1975, though he was never medicated for that condition, according to documents.
In the final years before his death, according to Blair, Bucher became increasingly suspicious of his two brothers-in-law, falsely accusing them of stealing.
The library and the state maintain that Bucher's suspicions did not make him insane.