Wills & Trusts Law Reports | Winter 2023 #193The deceased died on 16 September 2021 leaving what purported to be a will dated 4 July 2021. It was signed by her and witnessed by a neighbour and a chartered accountant. It appointed the defendant, her daughter, as executrix and beneficiary of her entire estate.
The deceased’s other surviving children (the first claimant and the second claimant) and the children of a deceased child of the deceased (Vicky) (the third to sixth claimants) challenged the will on the grounds of lack of testamentary capacity, lack of knowledge and approval, and undue influence by the defendant over th...
Wills & Trusts Law Reports | Autumn 2023 #192Stanley was married to Agnes and had three children: Ronald, Martin and Jennifer. He also had eight grandchildren including Jennifer’s daughter Emma and Ronald’s son Luke. Stanley separated from Agnes in the 1980s and moved in with his partner Kathleen, supported for many years by her daughter, the defendant. In 2010, Stanley and Kathleen each made wills leaving half shares in their new jointly owned home in Birmingham (the ‘Bungalow’) to Martin and the defendant. Kathleen died in April 2014 and Stanley handed the deeds to the Bungalow to the defendant in an envelope marked ‘Di, keep saf...
Wills & Trusts Law Reports | Spring 2023 #190The claimants were all siblings and the biological children of Reginald McLean (Reginald), by his first marriage. The defendant was the biological child of Reginald and his second wife, Maureen (the deceased).
By mirror wills executed on 23 June 2017, Reginald and the deceased both left their estates to each other as survivors, and the residuary estate of the surviving spouse to the claimants and the defendant in equal shares (the 2017 wills). Following Reginald’s death, the deceased executed a new will on 16 August 2019 (the 2019 will) revoking her 2017 will and leaving her entir...
Wills & Trusts Law Reports | Winter 2022 #189Jean Mary Clitheroe (the deceased) had three children, one of whom (her elder daughter) predeceased without issue. The appellant and respondent were her surviving children, the latter of whom was a victim of sexual abuse committed by her father. This had been detailed in letters written by her father and which were used in divorce proceedings by the deceased. The deceased had been profoundly affected by her elder daughter’s terminal diagnosis and death and became estranged from the respondent to the point that she started to maintain, and continued to maintain until her own death, that t...
Ken To and Catherine Hau explore the success of challenges to wills based on fraudulent calumny in recent English jurisprudence It was not necessary for the party seeking to establish fraudulent calumny to prove that it was the only cause of the change in the testator’s intentions as to his or her testamentary dispositions. It …
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Wills & Trusts Law Reports | Autumn 2021 #184The deceased (E) died in March 2017 aged 84. The deceased’s last will was executed in July 2016 with the assistance of solicitors and after a capacity assessment was obtained from his GP. At the time of making his will, the deceased was suffering from moderately severe dementia and was grieving from the death of his eldest son (S) who had taken his own life in September 2015. The will changed the provisions of an earlier will in favour of the claimant (C), also a son of E, inter alia, leaving 58 acres of farmland to C.
The defendants were the sister, widow and eldest son ...
