In re Estate of Angle

• Decision Date: 07 May 2001
• Parties: ESTATE OF Amos A. ANGLE, Deceased. Appeal of: Faye Heinbaugh, Paul E. Angle, Joseph Angle, Appellants.
• Court: Pennsylvania Superior Court

777 A.2d 114

ESTATE OF Amos A. ANGLE, Deceased.

Appeal of: Faye Heinbaugh, Paul E. Angle, Joseph Angle, Appellants.

Superior Court of Pennsylvania.

Submitted February 20, 2001.

Filed May 7, 2001.

Kendra D. McGuire, Lancaster, for appellants.

James Angle, appellee, pro se.

Ronald E. Angle, appellee, pro se.

James M. Stein, Waynesboro, for Cline, appellee.

John W. Frey, Waynesboro, for Spielman, for appellee.

Before JOHNSON and JOYCE, and HESTER, JJ.

HESTER, Judge:

¶ 1 Appellants, Faye Heinbaugh, Paul E. Angle, and Joseph Angle, assail the orphans' court's decision to uphold the validity of a will. After consideration of the facts and law as well as the arguments of Appellants, we affirm the orphans' court's conclusion that the will was not the product of undue influence.

¶ 2 Amos A. Angle, a widower, died testate on October 31, 1997, at the age of eighty-three years. His will was dated April 14, 1997, and was probated on June 22, 1998, by the Franklin County Register of Wills. Appellants filed an appeal from probate to the orphans' court. They alleged both that the decedent lacked testamentary capacity and that the will was procured by the undue influence of Ronald Angle, Martha Spielman, and Elizabeth ("Libby") Cline. Both contestants and proponents of the will are children of the decedent. Proponents benefited more than contestants from the probated will. The orphans' court heard testimony and issued findings of fact and conclusions of law upholding the validity of the will. This appeal followed denial of Appellants' exceptions to that decision.

¶ 3 No one suggests that the evidence fails to support the factual findings of the orphans' court. Accordingly, we now review those findings. Decedent and his wife had ten children, three of whom predeceased Mr. Angle. Three of the surviving seven children are proponents of the will, three are contestants, and the seventh, James Angle, was named as a proponent but testified in favor of the contestants. Decedent owned two pieces of real estate, one located on Hunter Road in Montgomery Township and the other located at Two Top Road in Mercersburg.

¶ 4 Mr. Angle executed a will on June 25, 1982. In that will, he granted Libby one acre of land on the Hunter Road property as well as a trailer situated on that land. There is also a house located on Hunter Road and eleven surrounding acres. The house and remaining acreage were not specifically devised in the 1982 will but passed through the residuary estate. The residuary estate was divided into tenths, with nine of Mr. Angle's children receiving a share and the remaining one-tenth share going to charity.

¶ 5 The contested will, as noted, was executed on April 14, 1997. In that will, Mr. Angle devised two acres of the Hunter Road property, including the house and trailer, to Libby. In addition, he specifically devised the remaining acreage on Hunter Road to Ronald Angle. Mr. Angle also owned a house on the Two Top Road property. That property, which was not specifically devised in the 1982 will, was granted to Martha Spielman for life in the 1997 will. The beneficiaries of the residuary estate remained unchanged. James and Ronald, who were the executors under the 1982 will, remained executors under this will. The 1997 will was prepared by Mr. Angle's attorney, Thomas. B. Steiger, Jr.; it was witnessed by Mr. Steiger and Mr. Steiger's secretary.

¶ 6 Mr. Angle's estate is worth approximately $300,000. The Two Top Road property was appraised at $75,000 to $80,000, and the Hunter Road property was appraised at $84,000 to $99,000.

¶ 7 Appellants-contestants alleged that Mr. Angle suffered from Alzheimer's disease, which prevented him from having testamentary capacity and also permitted Appellees-proponents to exercise undue influence over him so that they benefited more from the 1997 will than they had under the 1982 will.

¶ 8 Three of decedent's ten children died of cancer after the 1982 will was executed. Of the remaining seven children, six live in the Franklin County area and one lives in Utah. Mr. Angle lived in the house on Two Top Road until two months before his death, when he entered a nursing home. He was a retired carpenter and had built the house on Hunter Road in the late 1950s.

¶ 9 Although retired many years before his death, Mr. Angle remained physically active and continued to perform carpentry and other handyman projects. He attended church and his grandchildren's sporting events and maintained his own properties by cutting grass, shoveling coal, and shoveling snow, even into the last few months of his life. He also rode his bicycle several miles almost daily and continued to drive his car. He attended family gatherings and vacations and continued to hunt both in Franklin County and in the west. The orphans' court indicated that everyone described Mr. Angle as an independent, self-reliant man who was stubborn, occasionally bossy and gruff, and was unswayed by other's opinions.

¶ 10 After Mr. Angle's wife died in 1974, Mr. Angle remained in his home on Two Top Road. His daughter, Martha, to whom he left the life estate in that house, moved in with him in 1979, after she separated from her husband. Martha, who worked as a nursing assistant, remained in that house until her father's death. Martha and her father had separate lives, and while she occasionally cooked for him, he usually cooked his own meals. Martha cleaned the house, did the laundry, and gave her father his medications. Mr. Angle paid the household bills, mowed the grass, and maintained the house. He did not charge Martha rent.

¶ 11 Mr. Angle also allowed Martha's estranged husband to live on a trailer a short distance from the house. Martha did not like this arrangement, and she often fought with her father over it. Mr. Angle refused to remove the ex-husband from the trailer because Mr. Angle liked him. At the hearing, the ex-husband testified that in 1993, he had asked to buy the land on which his trailer sat, but Mr. Angle refused because he did not want to sell the land where Martha lived.

¶ 12 The Hunter Road property, as noted, had both a trailer and a house located on it. Libby Cline, her husband, and their three children lived in the trailer until 1993. At that time, Libby became pregnant with her fourth child. This event was a surprise since she had undergone a tubal ligation in 1986. At that time, Libby also was undergoing reconstructive surgery following an occurrence of breast cancer. She asked Mr. Angle if she and the children could move into the house on Hunter Road, which was rented at the time, and he agreed. Libby testified that she told her father she wanted to purchase the home, but he declined payment and indicated that he considered the property as belonging to her already. Libby and her husband refurbished the home and invested $15,000 of their own money. Mr. Angle also contributed financially to improving the house at that time. Libby testified that over the years, she frequently offered to purchase the Hunter Road house, but Mr. Angle continually declined, always saying that he already considered the home as hers.

¶ 13 Ronald Angle, who received the acreage on Hunter Road not given to Libby, was Mr. Angle's youngest son. He lived near his father on Two Top Road, and enjoyed a very close relationship with his father for many years. They hunted and worked on carpentry projects together. Mr. Angle also was close with Ronald's wife and their two sons.

¶ 14 Rex Sanders, who was Libby's neighbor and a friend to Libby and Mr. Angle, testified as follows. In 1993, Mr. Angle told him that he wanted to update his will to leave Ronald the mountain acreage on Hunter Road so that Ronald could pass the land down to his own two sons and keep the land in the Angle name. Mr. Angle also told him that he wanted to give the home on Hunter Road to Libby because he felt that she never would be able to afford a home. Ronald confirmed Mr. Sander's testimony regarding Mr. Angle's intent. Ronald testified that his father also told him that he wanted to give Libby the home on Hunter Road due to her financial circumstances.

¶ 15 After 1993 and up until he entered a nursing home in August 1997, Mr. Angle spent most of his time with Libby's family on Hunter Road. He was extremely attached to Libby's fourth child, Alicia, who had been born with Down's Syndrome. He had a key to the house and either drove, walked, or rode his bicycle there as often as three times a day. Mr. Angle often would give either Libby or her children money from his social security check.

¶ 16 The orphans' court noted that the evidence clearly showed that there were longstanding tensions and jealousies among the children due to the contestants' belief that Libby, Martha, and Libby's children were being favored and were taking advantage of Mr. Angle's generosity. Libby's adult daughter testified that she ceased attending family gatherings in 1995 or 1996 because she would overhear negative comments about her parents made by the other relatives.

¶ 17 Mr. Angle started to become forgetful in the early 1990s. He sometimes became disoriented in the forest during hunting trips and occasionally missed doctors' appointments unless reminded about them. He continued to drive and often babysat Mr. Sanders's children. He continued to handle his financial affairs without assistance until fall of 1996.

¶ 18 In fall of 1996, Mr. Angle came to his attorney's office unaccompanied and told Mr. Steiger that he wanted to change his will to leave additional acreage to Libby. Since Mr. Angle did not have an appointment, the two men were not able to discuss the matter in detail.

¶ 19 By the end of 1996, bank tellers began to notice Mr. Angle was experiencing difficulty with transactions. Around this time, Libby approached her father and asked for a loan. Her husband had suffered an injury and was not able to work but had been denied workers' compensation benefits. She also...