Knight v. Edwards
| Decision Date | 10 February 1954 |
| Docket Number | No. A-4303,A-4303 |
| Citation | 264 S.W.2d 692,153 Tex. 170 |
| Parties | KNIGHT et al. v. EDWARDS. |
| Court | Texas Supreme Court |
Benson & Howard, Lubbock, Underwood, Wilson, Sutton, Heare & Boyce, Amarillo, Looney, Clark & Moorhead, Austin, for petitioners.
Klett, Bean & Evans and Trout & Jones, Lubbock, for respondent.
Petitioners are the proponents and respondent is the contestant of the will of Mrs. Lou Lockhart.
At the conclusion of the evidence, the trial judge granted the petitioners' motion for an instructed verdict and admitted the will to probate. The Court of Civil Appeals reversed the judgment of the trial court and remanded the cause for retrial. In re Lockhart's Estate, 258 S.W.2d 877.
The basis of the contest was that at the time she made her will the testatrix lacked testamentary capacity because she was the victim of an insane delusion. The Court of Civil Appeals has held that the state of the evidence was such as to make that question a fact issue which should have been submitted to the jury, and that holding is the only one brought here for review.
The position of the respondent is that at the time she made her will Mrs. Lockhart was laboring under an insane delusion that she had 'lost' her granddaughter (the respondent), and that by reason of this delusion she made an unnatural disposition of her property, failing to recognize the claim of respondent as a natural object of her bounty.
Mrs. Lou Lockhart, the testatrix, was the mother of three children, two, Mrs. Leona Knight and Jess Lockhart, by her first husband, and one, Mrs. Ernestine Watson, by her second husband, Judge G. E. Lockhart. Respondent, Kaye Lockhart Edwards, is the only child of Jess Lockhart, now deceased. Mrs. Knight and Mrs. Watson, the two surviving children, are the proponents of the will.
Jess Lockhart died intestate January 22, 1940. His daughter, the respondent, was born about four months thereafter on May 17, 1940. Judge G. E. Lockhart died intestate August 5, 1941. Mrs. Lockhart's will is dated May 26, 1942. By her will she left her 'cluster diamond with sapphires around the setting' to the respondent, a 'diamond ring having a large diamond in the center with four small diamonds on each side' to her daughter, Mrs. Knight, a 'solitaire diamond bar pin' and a 'diamond Eastern Star pin' to her daughter, Mrs. Watson, and all of the remainder of her property to the two daughters. Mrs. Lockhart died November 8, 1951. In 1945 respondent's mother, Mrs. Alma Lockhart, married A. P. Edwards who adopted respondent.
There is no need to review the evidence offered on the trial by the proponents to establish the testatrix' general mental soundness and capacity to make a will Suffice it to say that the strength and cogency of that evidence was such, in the absence of evidence of a contrary nature, to put the matter beyond all controversy. But to establish that as to her the will was a product of an insane delusion, respondent relied on certain testimony now to be detailed, fortified by the opinion of a psychiatrist given in answer to a hypothetical question.
At the time of his death Jess Lockhart and his wife resided in the City of Lubbock across the street from Judge G. E. and Mrs. Lou Lockhart, where respondent and her mother continued to live for some time following the death of Jess Lockhart and the birth of respondent. The record reveals that Judge and Mrs. Lockhart were extremely fond of and attentive toward respondent in the early months of her life, having her in their home frequently after her mother accepted employment following Jess Lockhart's death. The record further reveals, without controversy, that in due course the friendly relationship between respondent's mother and Judge and Mrs. Lockhart became somewhat strained and that the relationship between respondent's mother and Mrs. Ernestine Watson and her husband, Bill Edd Watson, became severely strained, leading finally to a telephone conversation between the mother and Mrs. Lou Lockhart in which the future relationship between respondent and her grandmother and Judge Lockhart was discussed. According to the respondent, this telephone conversation was the basis of Mrs. Lockhart's delusion that she had 'lost' her granddaughter. Respondent never again visited with her grandmother and Judge Lockhart, in their home or elsewhere, during Judge Lockhart's lifetime, although it may be noted that Mrs. Lockhart frequently through her remaining years inquired of her friends how respondent looked, what she wore, etc., and that respondent was taken to the Lockhart home for a short stay at the time of Judge Lockhart's death and was permitted a visit with testatrix on at least one other occasion in 1950.
Respondent's version of the aforesaid telephone conversation is that her mother only limited or restricted her right of visitation with the grandparents by forbidding them to ever ask for or have her in their home when Mr. and Mrs. Watson were present, the mother having theretofore insisted that they not have her at their home after five o'clock in the afternoon when she returned home from work. She points out that in spite of the fact that the right of visitation was only limited by the foregoing restrictions, Mrs. Lockhart nevertheless persisted in a false belief and delusion that she had been denied all right to see or visit the respondent and that she had therefore 'lost' her.
Respondent's evidence that Mrs. Lockhart entertained the belief just mentioned is based on the testimony of three witnesses. Dr. V. V. Clark, personal physician and close friend of Mrs. Lockhart, testified that some time prior to the death of her husband Mrs. Lockhart discussed the matter with him on the telephone and, while choked-up or crying, told him that 'the child was just taken completely away from them'; that 'she had been denied and deprived of the privilege of being with or seeing her grandchild', and that she might 'never get to see her no more.' Mrs. Morton J. Smith, a close friend of Judge Lockhart and the testatrix, testified that Mrs. Lockhart frequently talked to her of Kaye, and that there came a time when she 'indicated by her conversation that she had the feeling that she had lost this grandchild.' Mrs. Mamie Fite, a department store employee and a casual acquaintance of Mrs. Lockhart, testified that 'in recent years' she had a casual conversation with her at the termination of which Mrs. Lockhart took the witness by the arm and said: 'and I guess you knew that Alma (respondent's mother) wouldn't let me see my grandchild, didn't you?'
Respondent's contention that the testatrix' belief that she could not see her grandchild and had lost her was a false belief and a delusion, but that she persisted in it in spite of evidence to the contrary, finds support in the testimony of her mother, Mrs. Alma Edwards, her adopted father, A. P. Edwards, her nurse, Mrs. Norene Salsbury, and Mrs. Fay Wiginton. Mrs. Edwards testified that other than the restriction on the right of visitation, heretofore mentioned, she had never been unwilling for Mrs. Lockhart to see or visit with Kaye and had never told her she could not see the child. Mr. Edwards testified that on one occasion he asked Mrs. Lockhart if she would like to see Kaye and upon receiving an affirmative answer told her that any time she wished to see her to call and 'I'll bring Kaye to see you.' He also testified that at his suggestion his wife wrote Mrs. Lockhart about 1947 and told her that she could see Kaye anytime they were in Lubbock 'and if she would call Mrs. Fay Wiginton, we would get Kaye over to her.' Mrs. Salsbury testified that she heard the telephone conversation between Kaye's mother and Mrs. Lockhart and heard Mrs. Edwards tell Mrs. Lockhart 'that she could see Kaye at any time she wanted to, and she could have her over there when Will Ed and Ernestine were not there.' Mrs. Wiginton testified that she told Mr. Lockhart, during a conversation concerning Kaye, 'well anytime you want...
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Nohra v. Evans, 12086
...is defined as a belief of a state of supposed facts that do not exist, and which no rational person would believe. Knight v. Edwards, 153 Tex. 170, 264 S.W.2d 692 (1954). A mere misunderstanding or a mistake of fact, or an illogical conclusion, would not constitute an insane delusion. Navar......
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Oechsner v. Ameritrust Texas, N.A.
...failure to submit the above requested language constituted an abuse of discretion, and thus error. We disagree. In Knight v. Edwards, 153 Tex. 170, 264 S.W.2d 692 (1954), the Supreme Court set up a two-pronged test defining insane delusion: (1) the belief of a state of supposed facts that d......
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Carr v. Radkey
...the legal concept.' The question involved the application of a legal definition. This same reasoning was applied in Knight v. Edwards, 153 Tex. 170, 264 S.W.2d 692, 696. See also Jackson v. Watson, 10 S.W.2d 977 (Tex.Com.App.1928), where it was held that the witness should not have been per......
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Taylor v. Taylor, 12809
...reciprocated by the son as reflected by his letters which were received in evidence. The Supreme Court in the recent case of Knight v. Edwards, Tex., 264 S.W.2d 692, clearly points up the distinction between a false belief or simple delusion, on one hand, and an insane delusion, on the othe......