Case: Re Simpson (1977) 121 SJ 224

Skillett v Skillett [2022] WTLR 679

Charles Skillett (Mr Skillett) and his wife had four children. Mr Skillett owned a smallholding and, on 7 December 2010, received a market appraisal valuing the smallholding at £50,000. On 19 May 2011, Mr Skillett and his wife made mirror wills which provided, in summary, on the death of the first spouse, for the surviving spouse to take everything absolutely, and on the death of the surviving spouse, for the smallholding to be given to their eldest son, the other three children to receive £50,000 and the residuary estate to be split equally among all four children. Mrs Skillett passed a...

Goss-Custard & anr v Templeman & ors [2020] WTLR 441

Lord Templeman, who was a former member of the Judicial Committee of the House of Lords, was the father of the second and third defendants and the father-in-law of the first defendant. In 1996 he was remarried to a distant cousin, Sheila Edworthy, and moved home to live with her in a property called Mellowstone, Exeter, which she had inherited from her second husband, John Edworthy. Following his second marriage, Lord Templeman became very much part of his wife’s family and developed close bonds with her step-daughters, the claimants. On 3 December 2004 Lord Templeman and his wife made c...

Elliott v Simmonds & anr [2016] EWHC 732 (Ch)

Kenneth William Jordan (Mr Jordan) died on 4 August 2012 leaving a wife (from whom he was estranged) and two adult children. The claimant was Mr Jordan’s partner during the last years of his life and the first defendant was his daughter from a relationship that predated his marriage. He had previously made a will giving pecuniary legacies to the first defendant and two of his sisters with the residuary estate passing to the claimant. Subsequently, in January 2012, Mr Jordan gave instructions to Mr Mumford (who was his brother-in-law), a solicitor with the firm Melia Mumford, to make a ne...

Pearce v Beverley [2013] EWHC 2627 (Ch)

John Pearce (Mr Pearce) died on 23 July 2008. His daughter, the claimant, challenged the validity of a will purportedly made by Mr Pearce on 20 June 2007 (the will) on grounds of lack of capacity and want of knowledge and approval, and also challenged a number of lifetime transactions said to be procured by the defendant’s undue influence.

Mr Pearce’s second marriage broke down in 2004 and he consequently became lonely and depressed. His health was generally deteriorating. He suffered from partial kidney failure, which was first noted in March 2005, and by 2006 from s...