Soper's Estate, Matter of

• Decision Date: 04 April 1980
• Docket Number: Nos. 10662,10663,s. 10662
• Citation: 598 S.W.2d 528
• Parties: In the Matter of the ESTATE OF Eunice Viola SOPER, Incompetent. ARCADIA VALLEY BANK, Plaintiff-Respondent, v. Elmo BLACK, Administrator of the Estate of Glenn H. Soper, Deceased, Defendant-Appellant, and Willa Kusman, Administratrix of the Estate of Eunice Viola Soper, Deceased, Defendant-Appellant, and Maynard Faulkner, Jerry Faulkner and Maynard Faulkner and Debra Lynn Owens, Co-Trustees of Glenn H. Soper Trust, Defendants-Respondents.
• Court: Missouri Court of Appeals

Page 528

598 S.W.2d 528

In the Matter of the ESTATE OF Eunice Viola SOPER, Incompetent.

ARCADIA VALLEY BANK, Plaintiff-Respondent, v. Elmo BLACK, Administrator of the Estate of Glenn H. Soper, Deceased, Defendant-Appellant, and Willa Kusman, Administratrix of the Estate of Eunice Viola

Soper, Deceased, Defendant-Appellant,

and

Maynard Faulkner, Jerry Faulkner and Maynard Faulkner and

Debra Lynn Owens, Co-Trustees of Glenn H. Soper

Trust, Defendants-Respondents.

Nos. 10662, 10663.

Missouri Court of Appeals, Southern District, Division Three.

April 4, 1980.

Motion for Rehearing or Transfer Denied April 22, 1980.

Application to Transfer Denied June 10, 1980.

Robert A. McIlrath, McIlrath & Maynard, Flat River, for defendant-appellant, Elmo Black.

Donald E. Lamb, Centerville, for defendant-appellant, Willa Kusman.

G. C. Beckham, J. Kent Howald, Beckham, Hale & Howald, Steelville, Marvin L. Dinger, Ironton, for defendants-respondents.

HOGAN, Judge.

This appeal is taken from an order and judgment entered by the Circuit Court of Iron County. Plaintiff Arcadia Valley Bank brought this bill of interpleader to determine which of several claims to the assets of Glenn and Eunice Soper should be honored. During his lifetime, Mr. Soper undertook to divide the property he and his wife had accumulated so as to avoid probate. Upon advice of counsel, the division was accomplished by settlement of an inter vivos trust and execution of a postnuptial agreement. In this action, the trial court determined that both instruments were valid. On appeal, the primary questions are: 1) whether the Probate Court of Iron County should have approved the postnuptial settlement; 2) whether the postnuptial settlement was fair and equitable, and 3) whether Mr. Soper's disposition of his assets was the product of undue influence exerted by respondents Maynard and Jerry Faulkner.

Stating the background of the case as straightforwardly as its convoluted nature permits, the record shows that on July 20, 1974, Glenn Soper and his wife Eunice lived in Maywood, Illinois, near Chicago. Mr. Soper was about 82 years of age; his wife was about 86. Both were in poor health. Mr. Soper had emphysema and was sporadically disabled. Apparently, Mrs. Soper had had a stroke; she was aphasic and unable to move about without difficulty. During the early summer of 1974, Mr. Soper had serious physical difficulty and became unable to care for his wife or to keep house. The Sopers had no children, and if Mr. Soper had kinsfolk of any order, they have not appeared. Mrs. Soper, on the other hand, had numerous relatives in Missouri, including two brothers, Henry and Willard Wood. Mrs. Jerry Faulkner, ultimate beneficiary of the trust in issue, is Willard's granddaughter; Maynard Faulkner is her husband.

Having decided he could no longer care for himself and his wife, Mr. Soper called upon the Wood family for assistance. Harrell Wood, ¹ Mrs. Faulkner and her husband responded. They found the Sopers ill and unkempt. Mrs. Faulkner decided to take Mrs. Soper to the Faulkner home at once; Mr. Faulkner, Harrell and Mr. Soper remained behind to attend to details.

Harrell and Mr. Faulkner shortly discovered that the Sopers had accumulated more than $170,000 in savings and that Mr. Soper had the passbooks scattered about his house. In addition, Mr. Soper had more than $21,000 in cash and negotiable instruments cached upon the premises. Inferably upon Mr. Soper's instruction or with his consent, Mr. Faulkner returned at once to Missouri with the cash and the passbooks. Mr. Faulkner then went directly to the plaintiff bank and opened a checking account in the amount of $6,269, established a passbook savings account in the amount of $5,000 and purchased a $10,000 certificate of deposit, all in the names "Glenn H. Soper or Maynard Faulkner, or the survivor of them."

Shortly thereafter, the Sopers were installed in the Faulkner residence at Belleview, in Iron County. In August and September 1974, the Illinois savings accounts were transferred to the joint checking account which Mr. Faulkner had established. By September, the balance of the account had grown to (approximately) $200,000. From late September to the middle of December, 1974, about $75,000 was invested in certificates of deposit made payable to Mr. Soper or one of the Faulkners; at the time the postnuptial contract was approved in December, a little more than $100,000 was paid to Mrs. Soper's guardian from the checking account. At the time of trial in September 1976, a balance of about $5,000 remained in that account.

Needless to say, the other members of the Wood family objected to the Faulkners' taking charge of the Sopers and their assets. They regarded the Faulkners' conduct as officious and overreaching and on several occasions, protested. Resort to the courts commenced after a confrontation between the Faulkners and two of Mrs. Soper's nieces and the nieces' husbands on August 11, 1974. Mrs. Naomi Cole (Henry Wood's daughter) and Mrs. Alta Sellers (Willard Wood's daughter; Jerry Faulkner's aunt), together with their husbands, called upon the Faulkners that day. Both nieces and their husbands were concerned that if all the Soper assets were transferred to the joint checking account, their aunt (Mrs. Soper) might be left without any means of support. In substance, they suggested that Mr. and Mrs. Soper should live with one or another of Mrs. Soper's other kinsfolk, and that Mr. Faulkner should divest himself of any interest in the Sopers' money. Mr. Faulkner rejected this suggestion.

On August 28, 1974 17 days after this confrontation Henry and Willard Wood petitioned the probate court to declare both Sopers incompetent and to appoint a guardian of the person and the estate for each.

In the meantime, Mr. Soper took counsel with Mr. G. C. Beckham, an attorney whose office is at Steelville. Early in the evening of August 12, 1974, Mr. Soper conferred at length with Beckham. According to Beckham, Mr. Soper wanted to divide the Soper assets so as to exclude the Wood family, to care properly for his wife, and to avoid probate. Soper also wanted Mrs. Faulkner to receive the residue of the Sopers' money after the death of the survivor. Mr. Soper believed his wife's brothers would try to have him and his wife declared incompetent. Beckham gave as his preliminary opinion that Mr. Soper probably could not prevent the Wood family from inheriting some of the money, but could probably accomplish his purpose by "tak(ing) a reasonable amount of (the Soper assets) and (putting) it in a trust." Beckham agreed to consider the details and contact Mr. Soper later. Mr. Beckham became ill, and was unable to attend to business until September 1.

Beckham associated Mr. Marvin Dinger, an attorney with offices at Ironton. The probate court set a hearing on the question of Mrs. Soper's incompetence for September 24. Before the hearing, Beckham and Dinger conferred with Mr. Soper in Dinger's office. The three men again discussed disposition of the Soper assets. Beckham and Dinger recommended that Mr. Soper obtain an order from the probate court permitting him to dispose of half his assets without his wife's consent by means of the trust and that with the court's permission, he execute a postnuptial settlement with Mrs. Soper's guardian. The specific purpose of the contract would be to effect a mutual waiver of property rights by the Sopers. Each spouse was to receive approximately one-half the Sopers' assets. Mr. Soper objected, saying he saw no reason to give half of "his" money to his wife's guardian, but he reluctantly agreed to this disposition.

The hearing was then held. In the presence of Mr. Soper's attorneys, Mr. Frank Mack, an attorney, various members of the Wood family, and Mr. Robert Carr, an attorney who represented Henry and Willard Wood, the possibility of executing a postnuptial agreement was discussed. The probate judge requested that the requisite documents be presented to him. Beckham took time to prepare the instruments he considered necessary and on October 4, he, Mr. Soper and Dinger again met in Dinger's office. On this occasion, the postnuptial contract, the proposed trust instrument, a proposed will and a petition requesting approval of the postnuptial settlement had been prepared. The corpus of the trust had not been designated because it was necessary to obtain the specific description of the items which were to constitute the corpus of the trust; otherwise the instruments were complete. The integrated transaction was discussed with Mr. Soper; Mr. Soper approved, and the postnuptial settlement was filed with the probate court. On December 12, the court entered an order of record approving the settlement.

On December 13, 1974, the inter vivos trust which Beckham had prepared was filed in the probate court, together with a will which substantially duplicated the provisions of the inter vivos trust by means of a testamentary trust. These two instruments were executed while Mr. Soper was a patient in the Mineral Area Osteopathic Hospital at Farmington. The general terms of the trust had been discussed on several occasions by Mr. Soper, Dinger and Beckham, but the specific items which were to become the corpus of the trust the certificates of deposit, for the most part had not been designated. On December 13, Dinger went to the hospital, again read the inter vivos trust and the "covering" will to Mr. Soper, and Mr. Soper signed those documents. The amount settled upon trust came to about $93,000; more than $100,000 had been paid to Mrs. Soper's guardian under the terms of the postnuptial settlement. The Wood family persevered; a week after the inter vivos trust was filed, Henry and Willard Wood moved the probate court to set aside its approval of the postnuptial settlement. Dinger and Beckham promptly moved to dismiss their motion on the ground that Henry and Willard lacked the capacity to sue.

Mr....