A contentious probate case has recently been resolved at the High Court, with the judge overturning a Norfolk farmer’s last will on the grounds of lack of mental capacity.
The case, which has been locked in the probate service for the past two years, concerned the state of Mr George Key who died in 2009 at the age of 90. The dispute arose between Mr Key’s surviving family – between his two sons and his two daughters.
In a will executed in 2001, Mr Key left the bulk of his estate to be divided between his two sons Richard and John, who had managed the farm for many years. His two daughters, Jane and Mary, had moved away several years ago and were left with £15,000 each.
However in 2006, Mr Key’s wife Sybil died and both women returned home to comfort him. When the family solicitor visited to hand over the parent’s wills, the daughters discovered they would not inherit a share of the farm. A week later Mary drove her father to the solicitors where he executed a new will dividing the bulk of his estate equally between the daughters – and leaving the sons no share of the farm.
When he died in 2008, the sons challenged the will on grounds of want of testamentary capacity and want of knowledge and approval. They alleged that the sisters had behaved improperly.
The sisters vigorously defend the case, until last week when a High Court judge found the 2006 will invalid and expressed doubt over their account of events.
The judge was highly critical of the solicitor who drew up the 2006 will, saying that he contravened the “golden rule”. The solicitor should have arranged for a doctor to check Mr Key’s mental state said the judge.
Instead, he had “accepted instructions for the preparation of the 2006 will from an 89 year old testator whose wife of 65 years’ standing had been dead for only a week, without taking any proper steps to satisfy himself of Mr Key’s testamentary capacity.” The judge also criticised that the solicitor had failed to take notes on his meeting with Mr Key and Mary, when the instructions for the will were given.