Jones v. Hogans

• Decision Date: 08 March 1944
• Docket Number: 14772.
• Parties: JONES et al. v. HOGANS.
• Court: Georgia Supreme Court

29 S.E.2d 568

197 Ga. 404

JONES et al. v. HOGANS.

No. 14772.

Supreme Court of Georgia

March 8, 1944

Syllabus by the Court.

The petition was not subject to the demurrers outlined in the opinion for the reasons therein stated. The verdict, while not demanded, was supported by the evidence; and the exceptions to the charge, as dealt with in the opinion, are without merit.

Mrs Effie Hogans sued Paul Allen Jones as guardian of Charles E Thompson, who had been adjudged mentally incompetent. By amendment, Thompson himself was added as a party defendant and Jones was appointed as the defendant's guardian ad litem. The petition prayed for the cancellation of two deeds one to her home in Gibson, dated October 31, 1939; the other to 149 acres of land in Glascock County and her personal effects, dated December 20, 1940; which properties together constituted her entire estate, conveyed to Thompson with a reservation of a life estate. The petition as amended alleged in substance that Thompson was her nephew; that she had no husband or children and lived alone; that prior to a gun-shot injury to him which resulted in his mental incapacity, he looked after all of the plaintiff's business affairs, and she relied exclusively upon him to guide her in all business transactions, reposing such confidence in him that she was entirely in his hands in such matters, and implicitly followed without question his advice and counsel in all matters; that at the time the deeds were signed she was aged and infirm and mentally unable to understand their contents, which was known to Thompson; that on October 31, 1939, Thompson took her for an operation to a hospital in Sandersville; that on the way he asked her to make a will leaving all her property to him; that she agreed to this request on condition that he look after her, which he agreed to do; that while at the hospital under the influence of a drug to relieve her pain, and in a semi-conscious condition, she signed a paper which she supposed was the will they had discussed, but which in fact was a deed reserving a life estate, to the house and lot in Gibson; that she was unable to read or write and was wholly illiterate, but had learned to draw or write her name; that the deed expressed a consideration of $1 (which was not paid) and natural love and affection; that after the plaintiff returned from the hospital and had recovered sufficiently to go to the business part of Gibson, and while she was passing the store of Thompson, she was called inside by him and asked to sign another paper, which she signed, remembering the conversation about the will and being in a weak and enfeebled condition incapable of understanding the nature of any transaction, and relying upon him in all things and upon his promise to look after her; that this proved to be a deed with a life estate reserved to the 149 acres of land and her personal effects; that being mentally weak, infirm, and illiterate, and relying upon the advice of her nephew, she was unaware of having deeded away her property, until May, 1942, after the shooting of Thompson and his return from the hospital, by reason of which he had become mentally incompetent; that Thompson is unable to look after her, and for her support it is necessary to encroach upon the corpus of her estate; and that the cancellation of the fraudulently procured deeds is necessary to afford her the necessities of life.

Such demurrers to the petition as were not cured by amendment, and which were overruled by the court, are sufficiently set forth in the opinion.

The plaintiff sustained the allegations of the petition by her own testimony and by the testimony of other witnesses, except that she did not state the alleged conversation about the agreement to make the will or that she thought she was signing a will. She said that she did not know she had signed deeds until after Thompson came back from the hospital, apparently referring to his injury; and that after finding it out she immediately went to a lawyer. Mrs. Mattie Newsome testified: 'Mrs. Hogans' physical condition was very bad, awful bad, before she went to the hospital. Her mental condition was just about like it is now, very weak. She knows how to go about the house and do what she has got to do, but so far as taking up any business or anything like that', the witness did not think Mrs. Hogans could do that. 'She doesn't know how to read and write, and when she was a young girl she had congestion of the brain and it left her almost a perfect blank, and she had to be watched like a child for a long time. She has had a lot of trouble the last few years and has been in awful bad condition; there has been something awful the matter with her and she has taken lots of shots, morphine or something of the sort, and when she takes one of them, she can't even walk by herself, she can't even stand up, and she doesn't know anything in the world. You can tell her anything and she doesn't remember it unless you tell her. For a while the doctor gave her one or two shots a week. The way she talks and acts makes me think her mind is in a weakened condition. She just doesn't talk like she knows what she is talking about, just like anybody else would that really didn't have the right mind if they were delirious. I don't think she has got her right mind none of the time, I really don't. She lived by herself in October, 1939, and in December, 1940. Charles E. Thompson was her nephew, her sister's son. When Mrs. Hogans came back from the hospital, she was very sick and couldn't sit up at all. Mrs. Hogans couldn't attend to any business at all. She is about sixty-four years old. During the two weeks after Mrs. Hogans came back from the hospital, [the witness] said something to Mrs. Hogans in Charlie Thompson's presence about making a will, stating that she ought to make a will and Mr. Thompson was sitting right there but he didn't say anything at all; he didn't open his mouth. Mrs. Hogans replied that she wasn't going to give anybody anything she had as long as she lived and when she died they could do what they pleased with it. That was nearly two weeks after she came back from the hospital. Mr. Thompson was a very good business man. He was a merchant in his forties.' There was evidence by Dr. Hinsley that while he could not consider Mrs. Hogans crazy and while he thought if the deed was read to her and she was not under the influence of a drug she would know what reserving a life estate meant, he doubted if she would know the meaning of the clause reserving it as embodied in the deed. Mrs. Wilcher testified that she had known Mrs. Hogans as long as the witness could remember and had observed her conversation and acts; that her mind was weak and had been weak ever since she was a little girl; that except her sister she had no relative closer than a nephew; that she was constantly under the treatment of a doctor; that the doctor gives her morphine or something like that, and she is constantly under the influence of it; that she was with the plaintiff at the hospital and while the plaintiff was not 'punctured' there, she was begging for it; that the witness lived next door; and went to school with the plaintiff, who never learned to read and had to be taken out of school. Joe Wilcher testified that Mrs. Hogans always had a weak mind, could not read or write, and if anything was read to her, she couldn't tell it to save her life; that after her last boy was killed, or killed himself, Mrs. Hogans looked to Thompson as her sole adviser and took his advice about everything without question.

There was evidence for the defendant by W. D. Allen, one of the witnesses to the deeds. He testified that the deed signed at the hospital was read to her 'and she rose up in bed and said 'this is what I have been wanting to do for a long time;'' that from hearing her talk and seeing her there listening to it, he thought she knew the nature and quality of her act. He did not know whether the second deed was read to her, but as far as he could see she seemed normal and knew what she was doing. Vincent Williams gave similar testimony as to the latter deed. Casey Thigpen testified 'The first time I saw this deed, dated December 20, 1940, Mr. Thompson came to me and said that the clerk had refused to record it because none of the witnesses was a notary public. He carried it to the clerk and the clerk would not record it because neither Mr. Allen nor Vincent Williams was a notary public, and I understood him to say that Mr. Walden said that Mr. Allen or Mr. Williams one would have to make an affidavit before a notary public that they witnessed it and he wanted me to fix it. I told him it would be easier to go by Mrs. Hogans's house and let her acknowledge her signature and let me witness it. He said that would suit him all right. So I carried it to Mrs. Hogans's house, showed it to her, and asked her if she signed it and would it be all right for me to witness it as a notary public, and she said it would. She said that was her signature and I asked her if it would be all right for me to witness it and she said yes. So I witnessed it in that way.' On cross-examination he testified: 'I carried this deed with me when I went to the home of Mrs. Effie Hogans on this occasion. I did not read it to her. I held it up like you have it now and showed it to her and told her Mr. Thompson wanted a notary to witness it and I wanted to know if she signed it and if I should witness it, and she said yes. At the present time I am counsel for Paul Allen Jones as guardian for Charles E. Thompson. I have known Mrs. Effie Hogans ten years. With reference to knowing the property she owns, I know the place in town, I don't know the farm. I don't know that she has been sick. I don't know...