Service-Public.fr replies:

No, Vanessa may not ask to break the legal parent-child relationship who unites her with her father to be discharged of her debts. The relationship of parentage between a child and its parent cannot be called into question for purely financial or emotional reasons.

No, Vanessa must not repay his father's debts.

The debts incurred by Vanessa's father are strictly personal. She therefore does not have to take the place of this failing father, as she is not responsible for her debts while he is alive. No creditor can come to ask Vanessa to participate in their repayment.

If, however, the over-indebted man can no longer cover his daily needs (food expenses, housing expenses, clothes...), Vanessa has to help him as a child. She and her brother could be forced by the judge to pay him a pension until he can support himself daily.

No, Vanessa cannot deny inheritance in advance. There is no such preventive action. Only the death of the father, who opens his estate, allows the child to refuse the inheritance with debts.

On the opening of the succession of a deceased by his death, the heir must choose:

• or to accept the succession outright;
• or to renounce it completely;
• or to accept it up to the amount of net assets.

So Vanessa cannot now step forward to refuse to take over her father’s future succession. She'll have to wait for her death.