Estate Planning Newsletter – July 2017

WHO HAS STANDING TO CONTEST A WILL?

In the case of the Estate of J. Don Brock, the Court of Appeals discussed in significant detail the category of people who have standing to contest a Will.  The specific facts in the Brock Estate case were that five adult, adopted children of Don Brock contested his 2013 Will on a variety of legal theories that the Will was not validly executed.  The 2013 Will excluded all five of the adopted children.  Because the five adopted children would have had standing to contest the Will (in that they would have inherited through intestacy), the Will was certified for contest.  However later, the Estate discovered a 2012 Will which similarly disinherited all five of the adopted children (the “Contestants”).  The Estate then sought to have the five Contestants’ case dismissed for lack of standing because they would not have inherited under the 2012 Will.  The Contestants then sought to contest the 2012 Will as well as additional Wills dated 2006, 1998, and 1994.  If all of the Wills were determined to be invalid, all of the Contestants would inherit through intestate succession.

Both the Trial Court and the Court of Appeals ruled that the Contestants lacked standing to challenge the 2013 Will because the 2012 Will was facially valid and not challenged as being improperly executed, and the 2012 Will did not leave anything to the Contestants.  Relying on 1906 and 1966 Tennessee Supreme Court cases, the Court of Appeals further wrote that for the limited purpose of establishing lack of standing, the validity of a prior Will is not required to be established by probate.  A party has no standing to challenge a Will when an earlier Will is valid upon its face, is not challenged as being improperly executed, and does not leave anything to the party attempting to challenge the latter Will.  The Court of Appeals wrote in explaining the outcome of the case that standing to pursue a Will contest is limited to those who would benefit under the terms of another Will or the laws of intestate succession if the Will contest is successful.

Such was the situation in the Brock case in that the contestants contested the 2013 Will, but the 2012 Will was facially valid and not challenged as being improperly executed after it was submitted to the Probate Court.  Since the Contestants would not benefit under the prior 2012 Will, they therefore lacked standing to contest the 2013 Will.

The Court of Appeals pointed out that the ruling from the Tennessee Supreme Court case in 1906 appears susceptible to a form of abuse of the law.  However, Tennessee law does not appear to provide a mechanism by which a contestant can challenge multiple prior Wills when the contestant is excluded from those Wills (unless the prior Wills are facially invalid or improperly executed).  The Court of Appeals finally wrote that it suggested the Tennessee Supreme Court revisit its prior rulings from 1966 and 1906 for an examination of their practical application.  The Court wrote “We are troubled that standing could potentially be used by a wrong doer to insulate his or her wrong doing from being challenged.

MY RECOMMENDATION:   The Brock case appears to result in an unfair determination of who has standing to contest a Will.  Unfortunately, there are various situations in which results may seem unfair on who inherits, but remedies would have to be enacted by legislative action by the Tennessee legislature.  The most common example I have seen of what seems to be an unfair result is when husband and wife have no children, they leave all their assets to each other at death at the first spouse’s death.  Then when the second spouse dies, frequently his or her blood relatives receive everything, and the relatives from the first spouse to pass away receive nothing.

Yours very truly,

RAINEY, KIZER, REVIERE & BELL, P.L.C.

William C. Bell, Jr., Attorney at Law