Estate of Cates v. Brown

• Decision Date: 28 July 1998
• Docket Number: Nos. WD,s. WD
• Parties: In the ESTATE OF CATES, Clyde E., Deceased, Arla Randol, Personal Representative, Respondent, v. Jesse L. BROWN, Deceased, Lois A. Fritze, Personal Representative, Appellant. 54371, WD 54551.
• Court: Missouri Court of Appeals

Page 909

973 S.W.2d 909

In the ESTATE OF CATES, Clyde E., Deceased, Arla Randol, Personal Representative, Respondent, v. Jesse L. BROWN, Deceased, Lois A. Fritze, Personal

Representative, Appellant.

Nos. WD 54371, WD 54551.

Missouri Court of Appeals,

Western District.

Submitted March 4, 1998.

Decided July 28, 1998.

Elvin S. Douglas, Jr., Harrisonville, for appellant.

Kevin K. Anderson, Harrisonville, for respondent.

Before EDWIN H. SMITH, P.J., and SMART and ELLIS, JJ.

PER CURIAM.

The trial court granted summary judgment in favor of the estate of Clyde E. Cates on a The appellant's decedent, Jesse Brown, died after the trial court's judgment was entered. Lois Fritze, personal representative, has been substituted as a party. The factual background of this case begins over 50 years ago. Jesse Brown first met Clyde Cates and his wife, Oddiece Cates, in 1946 when Mr. Brown was thirteen or fourteen years old. The Cateses lived five miles south of Harrisonville, Missouri. Mr. Brown lived nearby. He moved to Harrisonville and went to work first for a dairy and then for a greenhouse, making $5.00 per day. In 1952, Mr. Brown was unemployed. He met Mr. Cates, who told Mr. Brown that he had suffered a heart attack and could not work. Oddiece Cates was also sick and could not do much work. Mr. Cates asked Mr. Brown to come to work for him and help with his farm. In return, Mr. Cates agreed to furnish Mr. Brown room and board. He explained to Mr. Brown that he could not pay him anything at that time but that he would make it up to him once he got on his feet.

claim made by Jesse L. Brown, that the estate owed him $44,638.00 for personal services performed over a period of ten years, from 1952 through 1962. The appellant contends that the trial court erred by granting the estate's motion for summary judgment because Mr. Brown's claim was timely filed and states a cause of action for an oral agreement to make a will in favor of Mr. Brown. The appellant also claims that the respondent's motion for summary judgment was not in proper form and should not have been considered by the trial court. The judgment of the trial court is affirmed.

Mr. Brown started working for Mr. Cates on July 20, 1952. Mr. Brown's duties included milking eight cows, feeding chickens, working in the field, mowing pastures and mowing hay. Mr. Brown worked for Mr. and Mrs. Cates until July 20, 1955. He left because, although the Cateses seemed to be back on their feet, the Cateses had not offered to pay any salary. In August 1955, the Cateses found Mr. Brown in Augusta, Kansas, working at a gas station for 80 cents per hour. They begged Mr. Brown to return to the farm. Mr. Brown agreed to return to the farm. He did this, he later said, because he felt sorry for the Cateses. At the farm, he was given increased chores. He was provided room and board. Mr. Cates promised to pay Mr. Brown one dollar per day, but paid him for only two weeks. In the spring of 1956, Mr. Cates gave Mr. Brown five acres of crops. At this time, Mr. Brown was doing all of the labor on the Cateses 150-acre farm.

In the summer of 1956, the Cateses decided to go on vacation to New Mexico. Before they left, they went to Harrisonville. Upon their return, they told Mr. Brown that they had seen an attorney at the law firm of Crouch, Crouch & Spangler and made a will. Mr. Brown was told that when "anything happened" to the Cateses "everything" would be his. After that, compensation was not discussed, and the couple told him that everything would be his and not to worry about it. When Mr. Brown would get disgusted, he was told that everything was to be his.

In the fall of 1956, Mr. Brown made $400.00 on the five acres of crops that he had been given in the spring. He decided that this was not much money for two years of work, so in December 1956 he went to California. He did not tell the Cateses he was leaving, nor did he leave a note. Mr. Brown found employment at a laboratory at $2.00 per hour. The Cateses found him and started telephoning him, begging him to return. Mr. Brown returned to work for the couple on June 17, 1957. Once again, Mr. Brown did most of the work on the farm. He was given room and board. According to Mr. Brown at that time it was a common arrangement for laborers to receive their room and board in exchange for services. Mr. Cates gave Mr. Brown ten acres of crops, which Mr. Cates had planted in the spring, but Mr. Brown had to pay "grain rent," which reduced the net yield of the crops. Mr. Cates helped Mr. Brown plant crops on 20 acres belonging to Mr. Brown in the spring of 1958. In 1959, Mr. Brown "made better" on the crops, but Mr. Brown still felt he was not being fully compensated. Both Mr. and Mrs. Cates kept reminding Mr In 1961, Mr. Cates was given a 120-acre farm east of Garden City, Missouri. Mr. Brown helped the Cateses move to the farm. He assisted in rebuilding the house on the property. He was never paid. The Cateses did not allow Mr. Brown to live with them, so he rented a house and six acres of land. Mr. Brown began working off his rented farm for his own living. Although he would help out now and then, Mr. Brown did not regularly work for the Cateses again. He continued to help the Cateses three or four times a week until his marriage in 1968.

Brown that everything they had was to be his. During this period, Mr. Cates increased the size of his farmland. Mr. Brown continued to do almost all of the work with some help from Mr. Cates. Mr. Cates did not hire any additional labor.

On July 3, 1968, Mr. Brown got married. The Cateses were unhappy with this development. The Cateses refused to have anything to do with Mr. Brown or his wife. Mr. Brown said that when he told Mr. Cates that he was going to get married, Cates said, "he would tear the will up if I got married, and I said, well, if his word wasn't any better, it wasn't no good, then the paper wasn't worth a darn, either." Mr. Brown had never seen a will. He believed that Mr. Cates was serious about his intention to tear up the will.

Mr. Brown did not see Mr. Cates for many years. He moved to Pleasant Hill and then to Wheatland. In 1990, Mr. Cates came to visit Mr. Brown. He told Mr. Brown that Oddiece had passed away. Mr. Cates told Mr. Brown that he was "just like a long lost son" and was "still in his will." Several other people heard Mr. Cates tell Mr. Brown that the will was "still in effect." Mr. Cates died on February 11, 1992. Mr. Brown found two wills; a 1977 will made out in favor of Harold and May Roberts and a 1988 will made out in favor of Arla Randol. No will was ever found naming Mr. Brown as a beneficiary. Mr. Brown checked with all of the lawyers in Harrisonville, and found no evidence of any other will having been drafted.

Arla Randol was issued letters testamentary as personal representative of Mr. Cates' estate on September 14, 1992. On January 28, 1993, Mr. Brown filed a pro se claim against the estate of Clyde Cates. He alleged that the estate owed him $44,638.00 for services rendered over a period of ten years, from 1952 until 1962. The estate filed a motion for summary judgment on May 3, 1993. This motion was denied on June 28, 1993. A second motion for summary judgment was filed by the estate on April 11, 1996. After argument, the trial court granted the motion on December 17, 1996, without giving its basis for doing so. Mr. Brown died on December 30, 1996. The trial court granted a motion for substitution of a party claimant made by the personal representative of Mr. Brown's estate, Lois A. Fritze.

SUMMARY JUDGMENT

The trial court's grant of summary judgment is reviewed de novo. Adams Ford Belton, Inc. v. Missouri Motor Vehicle Comm'n, 946 S.W.2d 199, 202 (Mo. banc 1997). We view the record on appeal in the light most favorable to the party against whom the judgment was entered. Premium Standard Farms, Inc. v. Lincoln Township of Putnam County, 946 S.W.2d 234, 237 (Mo. banc 1997). The moving party bears the burden of establishing its entitlement on the record to judgment as a matter of law. ITT Commercial Fin. Corp. v. Mid-America Marine Supply Corp., 854 S.W.2d 371, 382 (Mo. banc 1993). Evidence in the record that presents a genuine issue of material fact defeats a movant's right to summary judgment. Id. A genuine issue "implies that the issue, or dispute, must be a real and substantial one--one consisting not merely of conjecture, theory and possibilities." Id. at 378. In other words, the dispute must not be merely argumentative, frivolous or imaginary. Id. at 382. If the trial court's grant of summary judgment can be sustained on any theory as a matter of law, we will not set it aside on review. City of Washington v. Warren County, 899 S.W.2d 863, 868 (Mo. banc 1995). "The theory need not be one raised or argued by either party and may be raised sua sponte by the appellate court, provided

the court incorporates principles raised in the petitions." Id.

STATUTE OF LIMITATIONS

In Point I, the appellant contends that the trial court erred in granting the respondent's motion for summary judgment because Mr. Brown's claim stated a cause of action for an oral agreement to make a will. The appellant claims that the cause of action accrued at the time of Mr. Cates' death and was therefore timely filed. The respondent contends that the motion for summary judgment was properly granted because, as a matter of law, no contract to make a will existed. The respondent argues that Mr. Cates made the alleged will before Mr. Brown knew of his intent and there was never any agreement to make a will in return for Mr. Brown's services. The respondent argues that because the services provided by Mr. Brown were rendered more than thirty years before the claim was made, the action is time barred under § 516.120, RSMo 1994. ¹

Section 516.120 ² mandates a five-year limitation period on actions brought under a theory of quantum meruit. ³ If Mr. Brown is proceeding solely...