Davey & anr v Bailey & ors [2021] WTLR 487

Wills & Trusts Law Reports | Summer 2021 #183

Alan and Margaret Bailey were a married couple who died each aged 71 within a few months of each other in 2019, leaving no children. Each left a will dated 28 May 2009 appointing the other as sole executor and sole beneficiary. After Mrs Bailey had passed away Mr Bailey attended a solicitor to make a new will, but it was not executed before he also died. The gift to his wife under his 2009 will failed, as she had predeceased him, and passed under the law of intestacy to his next of kin.

Mrs Bailey’s sister and brother, the claimants, claimed that the couple had made gifts of...

Donatio mortis causa: An end to deathbed gifts?

Sarah Bolt examines the current approach to deciding what is a valid deathbed gift This case was a prime example of circumstances in which a deathbed gift ought not to be allowed to validate otherwise ineffective testamentary dispositions. Deathbed gifts are back in the spotlight with the recent decision of Davey v Bailey on 26 …
This post is only available to members.

King v Dubrey & ors [2014] EWCH 2083 (Ch)

Wills & Trusts Law Reports | October 2014 #143

The deceased, June Fairbrother, (D), a retired policewoman, made a will in March 1998 leaving legacies to friends and family, the 3rd to 14th defendants ,the executors and legatees and the residue to the 15th to 21st defendants, animal charities (the charities). In June 2007 D’s nephew, Mr King, the claimant (C) had a conversation with her. She was increasingly elderly and frightened of going into a home, and he agreed to move in with her to look after her. He had spent some time in prison as a result of an offence under the Companies Act and was living in the property of a busi...

Donatio Mortis Causa: In contemplation of death

Vallee v Birchwood clarifies the doctrine of donatio mortis causa. Jennifer Lee explains ‘The definition of mortis causa has been refined over the years by the common law and its scope construed more strictly, underpinned by a judicial unease about the nature of this type of gifts.’ This article aims to provide a short overview …
This post is only available to members.

The Return Of The DMC: Death bed wills

Juliet Brook discusses a case that provides a salient reminder of ‘death bed wills’ ‘A donatio mortis causa (death bed will) is one of the equitable exceptions to the otherwise strict formality rules for transfers of property.’ For many practitioners, the doctrine of donatio mortis causa (DMC) is one of those obscure principles that was …
This post is only available to members.

Vallee v Birchwood [2013] EWHC 1449 (Ch)

Wills & Trusts Law Reports | July/August 2013 #131

On 6 August 2003, Cheryle Vallee (the claimant/respondent) visited her 93-year-old father Wlodzimierz Bogusz at his home. Ms Vallee, who lived abroad, told her father that she planned to visit next at Christmas. He replied that he might not be alive by then as he did not expect to live much longer. He handed over the deeds for his unregistered property, a house key, his war medals and a photograph album. The main asset of the estate was his property.

In December 2003 Mr Bogusz died intestate. Ms Vallee had been fostered and then later adopted after her mother and father’s m...

Donatio Mortis Causa: The doctrine of giving

Richard Selwyn Sharpe examines how a gift in contemplation of death is treated in the modern world ‘The gift must be conditional on the donor’s death and is therefore revocable until that event occurs. The donor sometimes expresses the intention in words to the donee that the gift is conditional on death but this is …
This post is only available to members.