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It is the oldest and most heartbreaking story in music. A superstar dies, the tributes pour in, fans mourn – but before the flowers have even wilted, their family is locked in a bitter battle over the millions left behind.
It happened to Michael Jackson and Prince. And it happened to legendary ‘Godfather of Soul’ James Brown.
But Dolly Parton? Surely not.
The beloved singer and actress, who died last month aged 80, spent her life ensuring that her enormous family (she had 11 siblings) was generously taken care of. Many of them were on her payroll for decades. She paid for private schools, university education and medical treatment. There were rumours of lavish gifts of cars and houses for Christmases and birthdays.
So, following her death on August 25 after a secret battle with cancer, those close to the music icon assumed her $450million (£339million) fortune would never be the subject of the ugly infighting that has plagued so many celebrity estates.
The woman who gave the world anthems like Jolene and I Will Always Love You long ago set up a trust to manage the rights to her music and assets, such as the Dollywood theme park in her home state of Tennessee.
But last week the drama that Dolly tried so hard to avoid spectacularly erupted into the spotlight.
Her nephew, Bryan Seaver – her head of security and the man she personally chose to announce her death to the world – has been accused of allegedly making violent threats and attempting to ‘extort’ her estate.
Following Dolly Parton's death, those close to her assumed her $450million (£339million) fortune would never be the subject of the infighting that has plagued so many celebrity estates
The singer's nephew, Bryan Seaver – her head of security and the man she personally chose to announce her death to the world – has been accused of allegedly making violent threats and attempting to ‘extort’ her estate
Court papers contain eye- popping details including Seaver – who served in the US military, worked for private military contractors during the Iraq War and has since set up his own security firm – allegedly boasting that he sold guns and munitions worth $29million to the corrupt regime in Haiti on the day Dolly died.
The lawsuit alleges that Dolly’s nephew’s behaviour has resulted in personnel working for She’s Alive LLC (the company that Dolly set up to manage her estate after her death) to resign ‘rather than risk retribution at the hands of Mr Seaver and his heavily armed confederates at his security company’.
Other employees have stopped going into the office and are working from home, while private security guards are protecting others, including at their homes, the court papers claim.
The son of Dolly’s sister Cassie, Seaver knew the star since birth and had a behind-the-scenes role in her showbusiness life since going on the road with her in the 1980s as a teenager.
For the past 20 years he had been her head of security, looking after Dolly and her various private and public properties including her Nashville home, museum, warehouse and downtown residence – a post that was previously held by his father, Larry. But Seaver’s employment was terminated on September 16 – three weeks after Dolly’s death – and replacement security put in place.
The Mail on Sunday has obtained a copy of the full court filing, including the 15-page emergency motion seeking a restraining order brought by Dolly’s longtime manager, Danny Nozell.
The extraordinary document claims Seaver used the knowledge that his aunt was dying to begin his orchestrated campaign before Dolly’s death.
Knowing that ‘Ms Parton’s passing could be imminent,’ the court papers allege, ‘Mr Seaver began invoking his self-proclaimed military-contractor experience, access to weapons and capacity for violence to extort SAL [She’s Alive LLC] into giving in to his demands for money.’
Dolly had set up a trust to manage the rights to her music and assets, such as the Dollywood theme park in her home state of Tennessee
Seaver, the documents state, threatened to ‘destroy the entire brand’, ‘ratf*** every entity that helps operate Dollywood’ and called himself ‘an international arms dealer and mercenary’, allegedly telling one of Dolly’s lawyers: ‘I’m a killer.’
Text messages filed as exhibits have Seaver – who delivered the news of his aunt’s death in his genial Southern drawl, against a sombre black background – boasting about becoming a celebrity after the video. ‘Everyone is asking to interview me,’ he writes. ‘I’m not exactly a media person. I’m literally an international arms dealer and mercenary. But I’m now the face of the biggest social media post in human history.’
In an email, he boasts: ‘I’m a killer, I sold 27 million $ worth of ammunition and arms to the Haitian police on the day Dolly died. Entertainment is not my thing.’
In another text he writes: ‘I’m going to set up a podcast dedicated to ruining Dolly’s brand partnerships and telling the violations these people have done on us. It’s going to be great. Or f***ing pay me. I don’t have the f***ing publishing or anything. I have the actual story.’
A further alleged threat read: ‘Her money better be bigger than I can make elsewhere or I’m going to f*** everyone. I am about to become the hand of retribution for my entire family.’
In an email to a person whose name has been redacted, Seaver writes: ‘I have spent my entire career breaking things and spying on African and Arab leaders. And protecting Dolly. She hired me to keep errant tour accountants in check. Literally so I would kick the s*** out of Northern Irish strong men, and Danny [Nozell, the manager] wouldn’t get beat up or our bus tyres slashed if he argued with them. I just happened to be her favourite child amongst us. I expect you know where all the bodies are buried same as me. Let’s have dinner.’
The court papers explain that, as well as She’s Alive, Dolly established the DP Dean Trust in February 1997, to provide for her family after her death.
Touchingly, she chose her rarely used married name ‘Dean’ for the trust. Her reclusive husband of 59 years, Carl Dean, died in March last year, aged 82.
Dolly with her reclusive husband of 59 years Carl Dean, who died in March last year at the age of 82
While many have speculated about the state of Dolly’s marriage, even suggesting that it was a front to hide her true sexuality, one Nashville insider told the MoS: ‘Carl didn’t like the spotlight. He worked on Dollywood for years doing construction. He’d be tickled when visitors came and asked him directions to the rest rooms, never guessing the sweaty guy in dirty jeans was her husband. In private she loved calling herself “Mrs Dean” so it’s no surprise she used that name for her trust.’
The trust was central to the hearing last Wednesday, when a judge granted the temporary restraining order, demanding Dolly’s nephew stay at least 1,000ft from any person or entity connected with it.
Seaver has vehemently denied the claims, saying in a statement: ‘Dolly called me her killer. It was a joke we used around her camp. I was her “baby boy ninja” and Danny Nozell took that text out of context to somehow imagine that I was threatening him. He’s always called me “The Killer”. I’ve never threatened anyone. These are my friends, my brothers and my colleagues.’
He added the legal action is spurious and ‘simply a publicity stunt’.
In a statement to celebrity news site TMZ, he defended himself further. ‘I am a security professional and I am a killer. However, nothing in this lawsuit were threats and most of the comments I stand by,’ he said.
‘I was talking frankly in a private way with Danny who I thought was my friend. A lot of these messages are two guys having rage talk and crying on the phone together while we were grieving.’
He declined to comment further when approached by the MoS.
The plot thickened on Friday when a source claimed to the New York Post that Dolly’s manager Nozell had his own agenda in launching the lawsuit. ‘He wants the family out of the picture, and wants to turn her house into Graceland,’ the source alleged.
Dolly started her own music publishing company in 1966, aged 20, which allowed her to retain the rights over her songs – and the royalties, which are estimated to be over £6million a year
Nozell is widely credited with revitalising Dolly’s career as a country singer and turning her into a modern superstar with a hugely profitable range of secondary businesses.
And while this insider said that he and Dolly made a good business team, they believed she was the moral compass of the duo.
‘Danny doesn’t have the heart that Dolly did,’ they added. Nozell did not comment on the story.
But some family members have been happy to speak. Danielle Parton, 50, is a pilot and owns a moonshine distillery. She is the daughter of Dolly’s younger brother Bobby. ‘I will not be talking about any trauma and drama in my family,’ Danielle told the MoS in an accent every bit as Tennessee as Dolly’s. ‘I’ll tell you right now, I don’t swim in toilets that need to be flushed.
‘Oh Lord, family’s important to everybody, even when they’re not good. Whether anybody wants to admit it, even a crappy family member is still important because they give you all kinds of lessons.
‘Of course, family was important to Dolly… She unconditionally loved us.
‘I know plenty of times we all gave her plenty of things to think, “You dumbass!” but she never was like that. She always saw the best in all of us.’
Danielle, who sang a duet with Dolly on the superstar’s 2024 album Smoky Mountain DNA, added: ‘She spent a significant amount of time planning a legacy for her businesses and her family for years… putting things in place to continue in perpetuity.’
She misses Dolly hugely. ‘She had a great sense of humour, and since she passed it’s weird to imagine a world without her in it because I still see her everywhere. She’s still all over social media, she’s on TV, she’s on the radio, so that piece of it hasn’t changed. I guess it never will change.’
Danielle’s father, along with Dolly and their siblings, grew up in a two-room log cabin in the foothills of the Great Smoky Mountains. Their father Robert Lee was a dirt-poor sharecropper while mother Avie Lee Owens stayed home to raise their 12 children.
Dolly wrote her favourite song Coat Of Many Colours in tribute to Avie, who hand-made everything. And to honour Robert, who couldn’t read, Dolly launched a literacy programme, which has given away millions of free books to children.
Another niece, Heidi, said: ‘Family was everything. After my grandparents died I would definitely consider my Aunt Dolly a type of matriarch because she was such a good preacher of acceptance and love, so everybody congregated around her.’
The daughter of Dolly’s late brother Randy, Heidi, 40, is a singer and songwriter who has performed at Dollywood since she was four. She remembers her aunt as an astute businesswoman ‘ten years ahead of the game’, yet she could be ruthless. Heidi said: ‘She was nice but there’s a difference between being nice and being kind and you do have to protect yourself. She was smart enough to know when to exit a room… That’s what made her so savvy.’
Dolly started her own music publishing company in 1966, aged 20, which allowed her to retain the rights over her songs – and the royalties, which are estimated to be over £6million a year.
She also had a 50 per cent stake in Dollywood, the theme park opened in Pigeon Forge, Tennessee, in 1986.
It is here that Heidi performs three times a day, five days a week.
‘By the time I was four years old I knew the entire show, the choreography and songs and everything, and my father let me on stage, and I’ve been doing it ever since,’ she recalled.
And she is hardly the only Parton employed in the family firm, for Dolly insisted on placing many of her family front and centre of her businesses. Her sister Rachel co-wrote a cookbook with her, while her brother Floyd wrote songs with her.
Dolly’s niece, Seaver’s sister, Rebecca, is the executive director of Dolly’s Life of Many Colours Museum. She also co-authored her aunt’s 2023 book Behind The Seams: My Life In Rhinestones. Dolly’s brother Randy also performed at Dollywood.
Rocking the smooth sailing of the Dolly Inc boat, then, affects not just one Parton, but all of them.
Not that Dolly’s sister Freida even acknowledges the rift, insisting on social media that ‘there is no feud within our family’.
‘No one among the Parton/Owens family is fighting over Dolly’s estate. We all love Bryan, just as we all love each other,’ she wrote.
Of Dolly’s 11 siblings, six have outlived her: Willadeene, 86, Bobby, 77, Stella, 76, Cassie, 75, Freida, 68, and Rachel, 66.
While Dolly had no children of her own, there are at least 12 nieces and nephews still living and an unknown number of great-nieces and nephews who called her ‘Gee Gee’.
Dolly’s will has yet to be made public and bequests to her huge extended family will likely take months to be distributed.
‘I never knew anything but family,’ Dolly once smiled in a TV interview, with her nearest and dearest sat adoringly beside her. ‘Yes, we all fight and scratch – but in a loving way,’ she added.
One can only hope, then, that the Parton descendants can rise above the current outbreak of fighting – and keep the scratching to a minimum.
- Additional reporting by Peter Sheridan
English (US) ·