In Re the Estate of Gardiner

22 P.3d 1086, 29 Kan. App. 2d 92, 2001 Kan. App. LEXIS 376
CourtCourt of Appeals of Kansas
DecidedMay 11, 2001
Docket85,030
StatusPublished
Cited by5 cases

This text of 22 P.3d 1086 (In Re the Estate of Gardiner) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering Court of Appeals of Kansas primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
In Re the Estate of Gardiner, 22 P.3d 1086, 29 Kan. App. 2d 92, 2001 Kan. App. LEXIS 376 (kanctapp 2001).

Opinion

Gernon, J.:

This is an appeal from an order issued by the district court granting summary judgment to Joseph M. Gardiner, III, (Joe) finding the marriage between Joe’s father, Marshall G. Gardiner, and J’Noel Gardiner to be void under Kansas law and denying partial summary judgment to J’Noel. We reverse and remand with instructions.

We note that this is the type of case in which the courts are required not only to weigh the legal issues but also to weigh the overlapping and sometimes conflicting positions of the parties and various interested groups. We acknowledge the several briefs filed by each side and the amicus curiae briefs filed by the Gender Public Advocacy Coahtion/American Civil Liberties Union of Kansas and Western Missouri and The Thomas More Center for Law & Justice. Each has been helpful.

Some cases lend themselves to precise definitions, categories, and classifications. On occasion, issues or individuals come before a court which do not fit into a bilateral set of classifications. Questions of this nature highlight the tension which sometimes exists between the legal system, on the one hand, and the medical and scientific communities, on the other. Add to those concerns those whose focus is ethics, religion, lifestyle, or human rights, and the significance of a single decision is amplified. We recognize that this may be such a case.

We concur with the observation made by the Supreme Court of Vermont when it wrote:

“It is not the courts that have engendered the diverse composition of today’s families. It is the advancement of reproductive technologies and society’s recognition of alternative lifestyles that have produced families in which a biological, and therefore a legal, connection is no longer the sole organizing principle.” In re B.L.V.B., 160 Vt. 368, 376, 628 A.2d 1271 (1993).

*95 I-Marriage Issue

I-A Court Procedural Background

Marshall died intestate on August 12, 1999. He was a resident of Leavenworth County, Kansas.

Joe filed a petition for letters of administration with the District Court of Leavenworth County, Kansas. Joe named himself and J’Noel, Marshall’s surviving spouse, as Marshall’s heirs. In his petition, Joe argued that J’Noel had waived any rights to Marshall’s estate, and, thus, he was the sole heir-at-law to Marshall.

J’Noel filed an objection to Joe’s petition. J’Noel also applied for letters of administration. The court then appointed a special administrator to handle the estate. Joe filed an objection to J’Noel’s application.

Joe then petitioned the district court to amend his pleadings. In his amended petition, Joe named himself as Marshall’s sole heir. Joe denied that Marshall and J’Noel were validly married. He contended that J’Noel was previously known as Jay N. Ball and was bom a man. He argued that despite surgery, a name change, and other steps taken by J’Noel to change sex, she remains a man for the purposes of Kansas law relating to the issuance of a marriage license. Joe argued that the marriage between Marshall and J’Noel is void since, pursuant to K.S.A. 2000 Supp. 23-101, marriages between persons of the same sex are prohibited. Therefore, Joe claimed, J’Noel had no right to a share of Marshall’s estate as the surviving spouse.

Joe also argued fraud regarding the waiver of J’Noel’s rights and fraud in the inducement to marry in that Marshall did not know J’Noel was bom a man. Even if the purported marriage was valid, he stated, J’Noel executed a waiver of any interest in Marshall’s assets. Joe also alleged that a premarital agreement was entered into by both parties.

J’Noel filed a response to Joe’s objection to her petition for issuance of letters. In the response, J’Noel asserted that her marriage to Marshall was valid. J’Noel argued that she is a biological female, and, as such, under K.S.A. 2000 Supp. 23-101, she is not prohibited from marrying Marshall, a biological male. J’Noel also stated that *96 there is no evidence that she, through a memo written to Marshall, intended to waive any interest in Marshall’s property and that no premarital agreement was ever entered into by her and Marshall. J’Noel further asserted that she told Marshall about the sex reassignment surgery she had undergone before the marriage.

Joe moved for summary judgment on the basis of waiver and estoppel and the invalidity of the marriage between J’Noel and Marshall under K.S.A. 2000 Supp. 23-101 due to fraud. J’Noel moved for partial summary judgment on the issue of whether she is legally a female and was a female at the time of the marriage to Marshall. In a memorandum in support of her motion, J’Noel argued that the district court is required to give full faith and credit to die Wisconsin court order changing her sex to female on her birth certificate and to the new birth certificate that was issued.

The district court heard oral arguments on the motions. The court denied Joe’s motion with respect to the waiver and estoppel, finding disputed facts in that issue. However, the court granted Joe’s motion with respect to the issue of the validity of the marriage, finding that J’Noel was bom a male and remains a male for purposes of marriage under Kansas law.

The court found that the marriage between J’Noel and Marshall is void under K.S.A. 2000 Supp. 23-101, that J’Noel is not Marshall’s surviving spouse, and therefore, that J’Noel is not entitled to a spousal share under the laws of intestate succession.

The court then stated that J’Noel has no interest in or right to Marshall’s estate. Accordingly, J’Noel’s motion for partial summaiy judgment was denied. J’Noei appeals.

I-B Personal Background

J’Noel was bom in Green Bay, Wisconsin. J’Noel’s original birth certificate indicates J’Noel was bom a male. The record shows that after sex reassignment surgeiy, J’Noel’s birth certificate was amended in Wisconsin, pursuant to Wisconsin statutes, to state that she was female. J’Noel argued that the order drafted by a Wisconsin court directing the Department of Health and Social Services in Wisconsin to prepare a new birth record must be given full faith and credit in Kansas.

*97 Marshall was a businessman in northeast Kansas who had accumulated some wealth. He had one son, Joe, from whom he was estranged. Marshall’s wife had died some time before he met J’Noel. There is no evidence that Marshall was not competent. Indeed, both Marshall and J’Noel possessed intelligence and real world experience. J’Noel had a Ph.D in finance and was a teacher at Park College.

J’Noel met Marshall while on the faculty at Park College in May 1998. Marshall was a donor to the school. After the third or fourth date, J’Noel testified that Marshall brought up marriage.

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Related

Lamb v. Benton
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Marie v. Moser
65 F. Supp. 3d 1175 (D. Kansas, 2014)
In Re Nathanson
112 P.3d 162 (Supreme Court of Kansas, 2005)
In Re RW Heilig
816 A.2d 68 (Court of Appeals of Maryland, 2003)
In Re the Estate of Gardiner
42 P.3d 120 (Supreme Court of Kansas, 2002)
In re the Estate of Gardiner
23 P.3d 902 (Court of Appeals of Kansas, 2001)

Cite This Page — Counsel Stack

Bluebook (online)
22 P.3d 1086, 29 Kan. App. 2d 92, 2001 Kan. App. LEXIS 376, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/in-re-the-estate-of-gardiner-kanctapp-2001.