A recent New Jersey estate litigation case addressed the issue of legal fees in a will contest. In the matter of In re Dweck, a grandson sued to invalidate his grandfather’s will, claiming that the will was the product of undue influence by the grandfather’s son Isaac.
Undue influence was defined by the court in Dweck as follows:
Undue influence is a mental, moral, or physical exertion of a kind and quality that destroys the free will of the testator by preventing that person from following the dictates of his or her own mind as it relates to the disposition of assets… Undue influence denotes conduct that causes the testator to accept the domination and influence of another rather than follow his or her own wishes.
In New Jersey, when the person contests a will based on undue influence, they must show that there was a “confidential relationship,” and that “suspicious circumstances” surrounded the will execution. Once the contestant proves this, the burden shifts to the other party, who must then prove that the will was not the result of undue influence.
In Dweck, the decedent’s grandson claimed that his uncle (one of the decedent’s sons) had unduly influenced the grandfather to disinherit the grandson. The evidence showed that, during the grandfather’s life, Isaac had been doing the decedent’s bill-paying and medical paperwork. Before the decedent executed his latest will, it was Isaac who contacted the estate attorney, and this occurred less than a month after the decedent’s other son had died. Isaac also drove his father to the estate attorney’s office, although Isaac did not enter the room while the decedent was executing the will.
The court began its review of the case by noting that a “confidential relationship” is not created merely by family ties; instead, it exists if, because of the testator’s weakness or dependence, he or she reposes trust in the person, or the testator and the person have a relationship where “reliance was naturally inspired or in fact exists.” Here, the court concluded that a confidential relationship did in fact exist, because Isaac was the only child managing the father’s finances, and he loaned his father money occasionally. “That relationship established the requisite dependence of decedent upon Isaac;” it was also a relationship in which “reliance was naturally inspired or in fact existed.”
The court also concluded that the petitioner had established the presence of “suspicious circumstances.” The court explained that suspicious circumstances “need only be slight.” Here, the proximity of the new will to the other son’s death, the fact that Isaac had initiated contact with the estate attorney, and that he drove the decedent to the attorney’s office to execute the will, “more than establish suspicious circumstances.”
However, the Appellate Court agreed with the trial court that, even if that burden of proof had shifted, there was no evidence that the testator accepted the influence of Isaac rather than follow his own wishes, or that there was any mental, moral, or physical exertion that destroyed the testator’s free will.
In other words, the grandson’s will challenge was unsuccessful. Because he lost the lawsuit, did the grandson have to pay his own legal fees? The Dweck court concluded that he did not. Instead, because the grandson had established a confidential relationship and suspicious circumstances, he had reasonable cause for contesting the will, and he was entitled to have his legal fees paid by the estate.
A copy of the Superior Court Appellate Division decision in In re Dweck can be found here.