In re the Estate of Jones

826 N.W.2d 540, 2012 WL 6652629, 2012 Minn. App. LEXIS 146
CourtCourt of Appeals of Minnesota
DecidedDecember 24, 2012
DocketNo. A12-0828
StatusPublished

This text of 826 N.W.2d 540 (In re the Estate of Jones) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering Court of Appeals of Minnesota 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 Jones, 826 N.W.2d 540, 2012 WL 6652629, 2012 Minn. App. LEXIS 146 (Mich. Ct. App. 2012).

Opinion

OPINION

STONEBURNER, Judge.

Appellants and respondent are children of decedent (father). During his life, father funded five certificates of deposit (CDs) held jointly by father and respondent. As father aged and needed assistance, respondent became his primary caregiver. Approximately four months before father’s death, respondent, at father’s request, withdrew all funds from one of the CDs to repair the home in which father lived. Approximately three months before father’s death, respondent, for reasons not explained in the record, withdrew all funds from the remaining CDs and placed them in an account in her name only. Father’s will named respondent as personal representative and divided his estate equally among four of his children, including appellants and respondent. Appellants objected to respondent’s failure to include funds withdrawn from the CDs in father’s estate. After a hearing, the probate court denied the objections and approved respondent’s final account and distribution, concluding that it was father’s intent that the funds in the CDs belong to respondent without being included in his estate. We affirm.

FACTS

Decedent Ronald Earl Jones (father) had two children with his first wife: appellants Ronald H. Jones and Jessica Warren (objectors). He had three children with his second wife: Gale Bristlin, Diane Jones, and respondent Charlotte Larson.

Between 1987 and 2005, father funded five certificates of deposit held jointly with Larson. Father intended that the funds be used by Larson to care for her parents and her sister Diane Jones, who is handicapped and receives financial support from the state.1

Father’s second wife predeceased father. As father aged, he became more and more dependent on Larson due to worsening medical conditions, including dementia. Larson provided transportation to medical appointments, kept track of father’s medi[542]*542cations, set up automatic bill payments, took father to the tax preparer, cleaned father’s home, and, when necessary, cooked for father.

In 2009, the city condemned father’s home.2 On December 18, 2009, Larson withdrew all of the funds from the largest CD (approximately $81,500). Larson testified that she used these funds to make the home habitable, at father’s request, because he wanted to remain in the home until he died. Father continued to live in the home until he was hospitalized for surgery in early 2010. Following surgery, father entered a nursing home for rehabilitation.

On January 14, 2010, Larson withdrew all of the funds from the remaining CDs. Larson put these funds, in the approximate total amount of $24,180, into an account in her name only. Father died on April 5, 2010, at the age of 91.

Father’s will appointed Larson as personal representative of his estate and divided his estate equally among objectors, Bristlin, and Larson.3 Because the house had previously been conveyed to Larson and there were no funds on deposit in father’s name, the estate consisted solely of some personal property. Larson had the property appraised and sold. After expenses, the net value of the estate was $3,486.80. Larson petitioned the probate court for approval of the final account and distribution of $871.70 per person to objectors, Bristlin, and herself. Objectors filed objections, asserting, in relevant part, that the funds from the CDs funded solely by father should be included in the estate.

Larson was the only witness to testify at the hearing. Her testimony established that, at the time she withdrew funds from the jointly held CDs, father did not have the capacity to make financial decisions due to his serious dementia.

Aside from Larson’s testimony that father asked her to use some of the funds to make his home habitable, there is no direct evidence that father intended to gift the CD funds to Larson during his lifetime and no direct evidence that he did not intend for Larson to become the owner of the jointly held CDs at his death.

The probate court concluded that, under Minnesota law, during father’s lifetime, the funds belonged to father as the sole contributor of the funds and Larson had no possessory interest or right to the funds. But the probate court noted that, had the funds not been withdrawn from the joint accounts, Larson would have been entitled to the funds on father’s death. Noting that there is no Minnesota caselaw directly on point and therefore no guidance on the proper remedy for the circumstances in this case, the probate court relied on the following factors to conclude that the proper remedy was to deny the objections and allow the final account and distribution:

• [Father’s will] does not refer to the CDs.
• From the evidence received at the hearing, there is no indication that [Larson] was involved in establishing the CDs and listing herself as joint owner. There is also no evidence of fraud, undue influence, or coercion [by Larson].
• [Father] gave $30,000 gifts to [Larson], [objector] Ronald H. Jones, and [543]*543Gale Bristlin, independent of the CDs he jointly held with [Larson].
• [Larson] was [father’s] primary caretaker during the final years of his life.... [Father] instructed [Larson] to take money from [the largest CD] to fix up his home so he could preserve it from condemnation, and [Larson] did this.
• Objectors provided no evidence that [father] had a different intent with regard to the distribution of the funds in the CDs to [Larson] upon his death. If the funds were ordered returned to the estate, Objectors and Gale Bristlin would be enriched against the established intent of [father] in the jointly held CDs.

The probate court denied the objections and approved the final account and distribution. This appeal followed. •

ISSUE

Did the probate court err by determining that, notwithstanding the destruction of any survivor-ownership presumption to jointly held funds created by Minn.Stat. § 524.6-204(a), the funds that Larson withdrew from the CDs before father’s death were excluded from father’s estate based on the probate court’s finding that it was father’s intent that the funds be belong to Larson on his death without being included in his estate?

ANALYSIS

This court reviews “a district court’s probate decision to determine whether its findings are clearly erroneous and whether it erred in its legal conclusions.” In re Estate of Neuman, 819 N.W.2d 211, 215 (Minn.App.2012). Questions of “statutory interpretation and identification of the applicable burden and standard of proof’ are questions of law subject to de novo review. Savig v. First Nat’l Bank of Omaha, 781 N.W.2d 385, 338 (Minn.2010). When interpreting a statute, this court aims to “ascertain and effectuate the intention of the legislature.” Minn.Stat. § 645.16 (2012). “Where the legislature’s intent is clearly discernible from plain and unambiguous language, statutory construction is neither necessary nor permitted,” and this court applies the statute’s plain meaning. Am. Tower, L.P. v. City of Grant, 636 N.W.2d 309, 312 (Minn.2001).

Free access — add to your briefcase to read the full text and ask questions with AI

Related

Vaughn Ex Rel. Estate of Bernhardt v. Bernhardt
547 S.E.2d 869 (Supreme Court of South Carolina, 2001)
Estate of Benson Ex Rel. Benson v. Minnesota Board of Medical Practice
526 N.W.2d 634 (Court of Appeals of Minnesota, 1995)
In Re the Welfare of M.L.M.
781 N.W.2d 381 (Court of Appeals of Minnesota, 2010)
Enright v. Lehmann
735 N.W.2d 326 (Supreme Court of Minnesota, 2007)
Hopper v. Rech
375 N.W.2d 538 (Court of Appeals of Minnesota, 1985)
American Tower, L.P. v. City of Grant
636 N.W.2d 309 (Supreme Court of Minnesota, 2001)
Shourek v. Stirling
621 N.E.2d 1107 (Indiana Supreme Court, 1993)
Carlson v. Carlson
363 N.W.2d 803 (Court of Appeals of Minnesota, 1985)
In Re the Estate of Nordorf
364 N.W.2d 877 (Court of Appeals of Minnesota, 1985)
In re the Estate of Neuman
819 N.W.2d 211 (Court of Appeals of Minnesota, 2012)

Cite This Page — Counsel Stack

Bluebook (online)
826 N.W.2d 540, 2012 WL 6652629, 2012 Minn. App. LEXIS 146, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/in-re-the-estate-of-jones-minnctapp-2012.