Paternity After Father is Deceased

[beccasmom_5]

My question involves paternity law for the State of: North Carolina

When I turned 16 my grandmother decided to sit me down and tell me that my "step" father was not my real father. I somewhat already knew that because of somethings that his family would say. I asked my mom about this and she decided to tell me the truth, only to find out that he died when I was 3 or 4. I was told their was to be no contact with his family at all, that was my moms rule. It wasnt until I turned 18 that I could contact them, only for his mom to refuse that I was his child. Apparently he was married with a child when him and my mother were seeing one another. At the age of 18 when you hear that not only your paternal grandparents are refusing to claim you and the man whom you thought was your father isnt...well that does allot to a teenager. A few months later, my paternal uncle did sit down and talk to me. He told me he was aware of my father and mothers relationship, he also gave me pictures and told me he would answer anything I needed. A few years went by and I learned that my fathers 2 other children recieved Social Security Benefits from when he passed away until they were 18. I have contemplated this for many years and at times I want to try and get the back pay benefits if I can and then other times I think is it worth it to open that can of worms. I know paternity can be estalished after a death especially since my paternal uncle is willing to do a DNA test. My Biggest question is: If we can establish paternity....am I entitled to the back pay from his Social Security Benefits???

[jk]

I don't know about the benefits but the standard 99+% certainty provided when testing the actual father is not possible with any other person. I can't remember the exact numbers but it seems like it's somewhere around 75% with a sibling. That is not enough to establish paternity in court so I suspect it won't be enough to establish paternity for SS purposes.