Lundy v. Lundy

• Decision Date: 30 October 1902
• Citation: 118 Iowa 445,92 N.W. 39
• Parties: LUNDY v. LUNDY ET AL.
• Court: Iowa Supreme Court

118 Iowa 445

92 N.W. 39

LUNDY

v.LUNDY ET AL.

Supreme Court of Iowa.

Oct. 30, 1902.

Appeal from district court, Mahaska county; W. G. Clements, Judge.

Contest of will. The opinion states the essential facts of the case. Reversed.L. C. Blanchard and Liston McMillen, for appellants.

Bolton & Bolton and McCoy & McCoy, for appellee.

WEAVER, J.

The plaintiff is executor and principal beneficiary of the will of his mother, Nancy Lundy, deceased, and offers the instrument for probate. The defendants, brother and sister of the plaintiff, contest the probate of said instrument, alleging that at the date thereof the testatrix was of unsound mind, and that the execution of the paper was obtained by the undue influence of the proponent. There was a trial to a jury, and verdict sustaining the will, and the contestants appeal.

Upon the trial, the proponent, having made formal proof of the due execution of the will, rested his case, and thereupon the contestants produced and examined as witnesses Milton Lundy, one of the contestants, and Robert C. Kiser, husband of the other. The testimony of these witnesses tended to show that the testatrix, at the date of the will, was about 74 years of age; that about three years prior to that date she entered into a contract with her son-in-law, the witness Kiser, to convey him the land, which constituted the principal part of her property, in consideration of which he was to move upon the land, and care for his mother-in-law during her life, and, in addition thereto, pay her a sum of money; that on the same date she executed a will making an equal distribution of her estate among her three children; that the proponent and Milton Lundy, upon hearing of this transaction, took measures to have it rescinded, and succeeded in having the contract abandoned, and the papers, including the will, destroyed. The contestants also sought and offered to prove by these witnesses that when proponent objected to the arrangement between the testatrix and Kiser he repeatedly stated in quite emphatic terms that the old lady was mentally incompetent to transact business, and could easily be persuaded into doing anything, and that he applied to his counsel to institute proceedings to invalidate said contract upon the charge of mental incapacity and undue influence. Numerous questions were put to the witnesses to bring out these facts, but the answers were ruled out upon the ground that they were incompetent, irrelevant, and...