Boyles v. Cora

• Decision Date: 14 October 1941
• Docket Number: 45745.
• Citation: 300 N.W. 281,230 Iowa 1057
• Parties: BOYLES v. CORA.
• Court: Iowa Supreme Court

300 N.W. 281

230 Iowa 1057

BOYLES v. CORA.

No. 45745.

Supreme Court of Iowa.

October 14, 1941

Appeal from District Court, Appanoose County; Heinrich C. Taylor Judge.

Action to set aside deed to real estate on the grounds of incompetency of the grantor and undue influence. General denial was filed. Lower court set aside the deed. Defendant has appealed. Opinion states the facts.

Reversed.

OLIVER, J., dissenting.

W. B Hays and C. W. Howell, both of Centerville, for appellant.

George A. Milani, of Centerville, for appellee.

MITCHELL Justice.

On the 17th day of April, 1940, Della Boyles filed a petition in equity in which she sought to set aside a deed made by her deceased husband on the 18th day of August, 1939, by which he deeded to Mary Cora, the defendant, two hundred and forty acres of land located in Appanoose county, Iowa. Plaintiff alleged that she did not join in said deed or have any knowledge that said deed had been executed by her husband. That her husband was of unsound mind at the time the deed was executed. That the conveyance of the described real estate to the defendant was made under undue influence exercised and brought to bear by the defendant. That the consideration was wholly inadequate. The defendant filed answer admitting the execution of the deed, and that Mrs. Boyles did not join in same. Defendant denied each and every other allegation of the petition. There was a trial at which a large number of witnesses testified. The lower court found for the plaintiff and entered a decree setting aside the deed. The defendant has appealed.

The questions which confront us are mainly ones of fact, which of necessity require a review of the evidence, but before doing this we will call attention to some of our cases.

In the case of Estate of Koll, 200 Iowa 1122, 206 N.W. 40, 42, this court said: " Viewing the testimony in the light most favorable to contestants, it may be said to show that the testatrix, at the advanced age of 91, when she executed the will, had for some years been failing mentally and physically; that she was suffering from senile dementia, the apparent manifestations of which up to that time being childishness, inpairment of memory, and the failure to recognize her grandchildren at first. During this time, however, she managed her home, looked after her bills and the payment of them; attended to her garden and her chickens; conversed rationally with her neighbors; and, at the execution of her will advised her attorney of the amount of her estate; gave him the names and relationship of twelve legatees, and the amount she wished to give to each; told him the disposition she wished to make of the remainder of her estate; discovered an error in the draft of the will prepared for her signature; and signed it only when it was corrected to meet her wishes. In the year following the year in which the will was executed her mental condition was worse, and then or thereafter she became subject to delusions, and 2 1/2 years after making the will the delusions were pronounced. These are the salient points in the record, briefly stated."

Advanced age is not, in itself, evidence of unsoundness of mind. Ross v. Ross, 140 Iowa 51, 117 N.W. 1105; Sutherland State Bank v. Furgason, 192 Iowa 1295, 186 N.W. 200. Nor do old age and failure of memory necessarily deprive one of testamentary capacity. Gates v. Cole, 137 Iowa 613, 115 N.W. 236; Perkins v. Perkins, 116 Iowa 253, 90 N.W. 55. To constitute senile dementia, in such legal sense as to deprive one of testamentary capacity, there must be such a failure of the mind as to deprive him of intelligent action.

In Perkins v. Perkins, 116 Iowa 253, 90 N.W. 55, 57, this court said: " His mind may have become debilitated by age or disease, the memory enfeebled, the understanding weak, he may even want the capacity to transact many of the ordinary business affairs of life; but if he has mind enough to understand the nature of the instrument he is executing, to recollect the property he means to dispose of, the objects of his bounty, and the manner in which he wishes to distribute it among them, he has testamentary capacity."

We turn now to the record to ascertain the facts. S. G. Boyles or as he was better known as Stan Boyles, married Della Boyles, the appellee, some forty-three years ago. There were no children. He was a farmer and stockman, and had served for six years as a member of the Board of Supervisors of Appanoose county. He was a successful business man, having accumulated something over five hundred acres of land and some personal property. The married life of the Boyles was not a happy one. In 1928, Mrs. Boyles started a divorce suit. She also at some date not set out in the record sued her husband for separate maintenance, and about two years before the deed was executed commenced an action to have him placed under bond to keep the peace. On July 22, 1939, the appellee was brought before the Appanoose county Insane Commission on information filed by Mr. Boyles. At the hearing she was discharged. According to her own testimony, during the...