If your father left you nothing, then you are fine. If your father left an estate, of which you received any portion, he MAY sue you to recoup that part of the estate which should have gone to paying off his legal debts. Simple as that.

If your father signed for the loan then you and your family have nothing to do with it, In England, they say your debt dies with the person.

If you refuse to receive any inheritance from your father's estate and NEVER SAY that you agree to be responsible for his debts, then you aren't. Receive ANY part of his estate and you automatically owe them from that estate, even if it is smaller. SAY you agree to be responsible for your late father's debts and you ARE.

If your father signed a written contract and has left an estate in his will, then collectors may have some legal rights, but if your father no insurance and no estate, it may be a matter of your state laws as to whether your responsible as a child of your parent, generally in most states, they have to write it off as a loss.

This is why men are evil and should all die. They screw you when they re alive, then their creditors screw you when they die. Welcome to Man s World 101.

You aren't responsible for your father's debt. They are trying to scare you into paying. You are your father's child not his wife, and even so, unless you are married to him and live in a community property state they cant make you pay

This is a very simple one. In any country or state I know of, his debts are HIS debts and only his estate can be sued for them. Only he was responsible for them when he was alive, and that's still true now he's dead.

So you don't need to prove anything. You are not responsible. It's not your debt. Only the executor is responsible, as only he or she is responsible for dealing with the estate and winding it up. And he or she is not personally responsible to pay out of their own pocket, only to administer the estate properly. They can be sued for not doing that properly, but not for anything else.

So it is entirely up to the executor to deal with the estate in the normal way. Obtain probate, pay any death taxes, pay the debts, and then what is left can be given away according to the will (or the intestacy rules - the law that says what happens if there is no will). Simple as that. If anything like the house has to be sold to be able to pay the debts, then it'll just have to be sold.

If there is not enough in the estate to pay all the debts, then everybody who is owed something gets their share of the estate and they can suck on air for the rest. This is an insolvent estate and the executor would be well advised to get a lawyer. Basically it goes like a person going bankrupt or a business going insolvent - sell what there is to sell and pay the debts as far as is possible, they should all get the same percentage of what they are owed, and when there's no money left, hard cheese! They don't get a bean more.

The only person or legal entity this colleague can possibly sue is the estate. And there is no point in them suing yet if the executor is still working on it and getting the matter through probate court. This takes time - I did it when my Dad died and had to put together a tax return showing the total value of what he was worth. It was a fairly simple estate, but it still took a couple of months to get a value of all his property and investments, do the paperwork, finally get probate from the court and THEN I could get all the bank accounts closed, investments transferred or sold and give everything to who should have it. Phew!

So ignore it. If you're not an executor, "Not My Problem!" If you are an executor, you still aren't liable to pay out of your own money, and you should rely on your lawyer to deal with it.

Now is there any tangible evidence of this loan, like a written agreement? If there isn't, the colleague is going to have a hard time winning against the estate if they sue. This reminds me of so many cases on Judge Judy - "it was a loan" - "no it wasn't, it was a gift". So all Judy can do is listen to what both sides have to say and give a judgement of what looks reasonable to her.

I learned from this! A friend needed helping out, I was happy to, but even being friends, I wanted it in writing. "I lend Hans this amount and Hans agrees to pay it back at this much per month" and we both signed a copy each. He asked "what about legal language?" You don't need it! Plain English will do as long as it's totally clear, and that is. He did indeed pay me back according to that but let's say he hadn't. Then I could have produced this piece of paper in court and it would be total proof there was a loan.

Edit - if you want to thumb this down, explain why I'm wrong.

if there is nothing in the estate he can't get any money

He has the right to recover from the estate. If you took ANYTHING that belonged to your father, he has the legal right to those assets, up to the amount of the debt.

Update: Your comment states that everything he owned was sold in an estate sale. The proceeds of that sale must be applied to debts. If you took so much as a watch, you can be required to actually pay market value for that item.

nope, bogus.