Ennor v. Hinsch
| Decision Date | 02 April 1935 |
| Docket Number | 42562. |
| Citation | 260 N.W. 26,219 Iowa 1076 |
| Parties | ENNOR et al. v. HINSCH et ux. |
| Court | Iowa Supreme Court |
Appeal from District Court, Lyon County; O. S. Thomas, Judge.
This is an action in equity by the executor of the Peter H. Hinsch Estate and the deceased's only daughter, against Henry P Hinsch, the only son, and the wife of the son, to set aside certain deeds, conveying real estate which belonged to Peter H. Hinsch, to his son and daughter-in-law, on the grounds that the deeds were secured through undue influence. The son and daughter-in-law denied the charges made and claimed the deeds were the free and voluntary act of the said Peter H Hinsch. Trial to the court. Decree denied the relief sought and refused to set aside the deeds. The executor and only daughter have appealed. Opinion states the facts.
Reversed and remanded.
Fisher & Riter, of Rock Rapids, for appellants.
Diamond & Jory, of Sheldon, for appellees.
Peter Hinsch lived in Lyons county, Iowa, for more than forty years prior to his death. He was the owner of 120 acres of farm land in the vicinity of George and of a residence property in the town, these being the two pieces of real estate involved in this action. In February of 1930 Peter Hinsch deeded the farm in question to his son, Henry Hinsch, and the town property to his daughter-in-law, Margaretha Hinsch. Eleven months later he died. He had prior to that time, and on, to wit, the 15th of January, 1929, made a will, which was duly admitted to probate, and M. C. Ennor, the executor named therein, who was a banker in George, Iowa, was duly appointed. The executor commenced an action to set aside the deeds, and later Anna Marie Sohl, the daughter of Peter Hinsch, joined in the petition of the executor.
Evidence was submitted, and the lower court held in favor of the defendants and dismissed the petition of the plaintiffs. These parties, being dissatisfied with the judgment and decree of the lower court, have appealed to this court.
Peter Hinsch died testate on the 24th day of January, 1931, at the age of seventy-four. He had some years before acquired two tracts of real estate, one of eighty acres and one of forty acres. He and his wife and family-consisting of his son, Henry, one of the defendants and appellees in the case at bar, and a daughter, Anna Marie-lived upon this farm, the father and son working the land, and, as far as the record shows, it was a happy family and a prosperous one, for the farm was clear and there was money in the bank. In 1916 the son, Henry, married. He was at that time twenty-eight years of age. After the son's marriage he and his wife lived upon the farm, and his father and mother moved into a small residence owned by Peter Hinsch in the town of George. There they resided up until the time of the death of Mrs. Hinsch, which occurred on March 20, 1928. After the death of his wife, Peter Hinsch moved back to the farm and lived with his son and daughter-in-law upon the 120 acres, one of the pieces of property over which this lawsuit was brought.
Peter Hinsch's daughter, Anna Marie, who is one of the appellants in this case, was married when she was quite young, and immediately upon being married she moved with her husband to Illinois and then to Davenport, Iowa, where she had resided at the time of the trial for a period of some twenty-seven years. She made frequent visits back home, and her parents visited her in Davenport. After her mother's death she made only one trip back, and at that time visited with her father at the home of her brother, Henry. No one can read this record and come to any other conclusion than that there was an exceedingly close relationship between the daughter and her father and mother at all times; that, while she had left home when still a very young girl, she had been in contact with her parents all of the time and had been a loving and dutiful daughter, anxious to do her part in making the closing years of their lives happy ones.
At various times Peter Hinsch made wills-four in number, three of them being drawn by Mr. Ennor. In all of these wills he left the farm to his son, with a provision that money should be paid by the son to the daughter. The amount to be paid varied in each of said wills. In the last will, which was the one admitted to probate, and which was dated January 15, 1929, Peter Hinsch left the farm to his son and directed that his son pay to the daughter, Anna Marie, the sum of $6,000. The deeds which the appellants are seeking to set aside were made, executed, and delivered on the 25th day of February, 1930, which was just thirteen months after the making of the last will and testament of Peter Hinsch.
It is the contention of the appellants that the conveyances complained of were made under duress and undue influence and were contrary to the intention of the decedent; that they were brought about by threats which the appellees made to Peter Hinsch when he was living with them on the farm; and that there was no valuable consideration for the transfers in question. It is also the claim of the appellants that the burden of proof, due to the confidential and fiduciary relationship which existed in this case between father and son, rests upon the grantees to overcome the presumption against them arising from such confidential and fiduciary relationship, and that the appellees must show, by a preponderance of the evidence, that the conveyances were not procured by undue influence and that said deeds were in fact the free and voluntary act of the decedent.
The first question is, Where does the burden of proof rest? Was there such a confidential relationship between the father and son in the case at bar so as to place the burden of proof upon the son to show the bona fides of the transaction? In the case of Osborn v. Fry, reported in 202 Iowa, 129, at page 130, 209 N.W. 303, 304, this court said:
Justice Weaver, in the case of Curtis v. Armagast, 158 Iowa, 507, 138 N.W. 873, in a very able opinion, presented and assembles practically all of the cases bearing upon the proposition with which we are confronted in this case. In that opinion he says:
" While the relation of parent and child is nearly always given as an illustration of confidential relations, it does not follow that all transactions between persons occupying that relation are presumptively invalid. Indeed, it may be said that as a general rule the conferring of benefits by a parent upon a child is presumptively valid. The unfavorable presumption arises only where the child, by reason of its youth and inexperience or other special circumstances, is to some degree under the dominion. control or paramount influence of the parent, or where the child is the dominant personage in that relationship and the parent has become the dependent one, trusting herself and her interests to his advice and guidance. Mulock v. Mulock, 31 N.J.Eq. 594; Parker v. Parker (N. J.) 5 A. 586; White v. Daly (N. J. Ch.) 58 A. 929; Fitch v. Reiser, 79 Iowa, 34, 44 N.W. 214; Nobles v. Hutton, 7 Cal.App. 14, 93 P. 289; Gibson v. Hammang, 63 Neb. 349, 88 N.W. 500; Doyle v. Welch, 100 Wis. 24, 75 N.W. 400; Cole v. Getzinger, 96 Wis. 559, 71 N.W. 75; Mott v. Mott, 49 N.J.Eq. 192, 22 A. 997.
This is in no manner inconsistent with the undoubted right of parents to dispose of their estate as they may think best. They may by deed or will dispose of it to persons outside of the family, or may give it all to one or more of their children and ignore the equal and perhaps superior rights of others. No presumption of fraud or undue influence arises from the mere fact that a mother exercises such right, or that she has preferred one child and left another unprovided for; but when, in addition to such a conveyance, under such circumstances it appears that she was at the time wholly dependent upon the grantee for advice, residing in his home and placing in his hands the management and control of all her business interests, and in all things manifesting her implicit confidence and trust in him, the taking of a conveyance of substantially all her estate without consideration and without any writing binding him to support her through life, there is a presumption of undue influence which equity will require the beneficiary...
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