In Re the Estate of Lane

188 P.3d 23, 39 Kan. App. 2d 1062, 2008 Kan. App. LEXIS 115
CourtCourt of Appeals of Kansas
DecidedJuly 18, 2008
Docket98,352
StatusPublished
Cited by33 cases

This text of 188 P.3d 23 (In Re the Estate of Lane) 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 Lane, 188 P.3d 23, 39 Kan. App. 2d 1062, 2008 Kan. App. LEXIS 115 (kanctapp 2008).

Opinions

Leben, J.:

Jeriy Lane’s children and grandchildren contend that Deanna Lane, Jerry’s second wife and widow, should have included additional property in his estate. As the administrator of Jerry’s estate, Deanna did not include the farm in her list of the estate’s property as she was its sole title owner. Nor did she include the leases that allowed gas storage and a cell phone tower on that farmstead. She did include half the value of some farm equipment and cattle on the basis that she and Jerry were co-owners of them, but Jerry’s children and grandchildren claim that she should have included the full value of those items in the estate because they say that Jerry was the sole owner of them. Jeriy’s children and grandchildren, as other heirs to his estate, also claim that the district judge should not have permitted Deanna to claim the homestead and spousal allowances because she had no financial need of them. In sum, the other heirs seek to increase their inheritance by removing the allowances taken from Jerry’s estate and by including the farm, the leases, and the full value of the farm equipment and cattle in the estate.

The district judge heard testimony and arguments, and he ruled firmly in Deanna’s favor — so firmly, in fact, that he adopted nearly verbatim the factual findings and legal conclusions that her lawyer had submitted. The wholesale adoption of Deanna’s factual findings has led the other heirs to contend on appeal that we should not pay any deference to those findings. But the findings of the district court are fully supported by the record; we cannot ignore them.

The district judge found that Deanna and Jerry didn’t have an agreement on how to distribute the farm, that Deanna co-owned the contested farm equipment and cattle, that Deanna had the sole interest in the leases as the sole owner of the farm, and that Deanna was entitled to the farmstead allowance and deserved the spousal allowance under Kansas estate law. Given these findings, which are supported by the evidence presented, we conclude that the other heirs have not shown any error in the district court’s rulings.

[1064]*1064I. We Accept the District Court’s Factual Findings.

The other heirs urge us to set aside the deference ordinarily given to the district judge’s factual findings because the judge adopted all of Deanna’s proposed findings nearly verbatim. But they cite to cases that explicitly reject their argument. E.g., Ortiz v. Biscanin, 34 Kan. App. 2d 445, 455, 122 P.3d 365 (2004) (“The district court’s action of adopting Biscanin’s findings of fact and conclusions of law in toto did not violate K.S.A. 2003 Supp. 60-252 and does not warrant our applying a de novo standard of review.”). Certainly, it would be good practice for a district judge to acknowledge the adoption of a party’s proposed findings and to explicitly assure us and the other party that the judge has independently reviewed them. And it would be better practice for a district judge to draft his or her own findings, but those practices are not required by Biscanin.

We see no reason to question the findings in this case. After trial, the district court ordered that the trial transcript be prepared and that the parties file proposed findings after the transcript was available. Deanna’s attorney had the opportunity to make sure that the record supported all of Deanna’s proposed findings. In addition, the district judge who heard the evidence had the opportunity to review the proposed findings against the trial transcript. Our review confirms that the record supported those findings, so we accept the facts as set out in the district court’s findings and from the record.

Deanna and her first husband owned a 247-acre farm. Deanna kept the fann after their divorce in 1977. Jerry and Deanna married in 1979, and Jerry had also been married once before. They both had children from their first marriages but had no children together. Deanna was an elementaiy-school teacher in Cherryvale; Jerry had served as a school administrator in South Coffeyville, Kansas, and Spavinaw, Oklahoma. Jerry retired in 1994 or 1995; Deanna retired in 1999.

After they married, Jerry and Deanna operated a cattle business from the farm in addition to working as educators. Jerry was primarily responsible for buying and selling the cattle while Deanna [1065]*1065kept the records and did the bookkeeping. She occasionally cared for sick animals or did farm chores. The two also acquired various items of personal property or farm equipment, mostly paid for out of joint bank accounts.

At one point, Jerry and Deanna discussed dividing the farm into 40-acre parcels so that each of their children could own some land. But they ultimately rejected that plan because some of the parcels would have been landlocked given the irregular shape of the farm. The district court concluded that the two made no agreement about how the farm would be divided upon the death of one of them. The district court concluded that “[t]heir intent was that the survivor could do whatever they wanted to with the farm,” a conclusion based upon Deanna’s testimony.

After Jerry’s death in 2004, Deanna was appointed the administrator of Jerry’s estate. She did not include any interest in the farm among Jerry’s listed assets and asked the probate court for a homestead allowance and a general spousal allowance against the estate. Deanna then executed a will that left all of her assets, including the farm, to her two children. She left nothing to Jerry’s children.

Jerry’s children and grandchildren, as the other heirs, filed pleadings that claimed Deanna held part of the farm in a constructive trust for Jerry’s estate and that some personal property should have been listed solely as property of Jerry’s estate with Deanna having no co-ownership rights. The other heirs claimed that an interest in two leases should have been listed as property of the estate. They also objected to the allowances. The district court ruled in favor of Deanna on all of these issues. All of those issues are now before us in a consolidated appeal.

II. The District Court Did Not Abuse Its Discretion When It Decided That Deanna Did Not Hold the Farm in Constructive Trust for the Other Heirs.

The other heirs claim that Deanna holds the farm in a constructive trust for their benefit and that the district judge erred in ruling otherwise. Such a trust may be imposed where it would be inequitable for the person who holds the legal title to retain the prop[1066]*1066erty based upon the manner in which it was acquired. See Garrett v. Read, 278 Kan. 662, 673, 102 P.3d 436 (2004); Hile v. DeVries, 17 Kan. App. 2d 373, 374, 836 P.2d 1219 (1992). The district court is given wide discretion on whether to impose a constructive trust as an equitable decision; that decision is subject to reversal only when no reasonable person would agree with the district court’s decision. Cousatte v. Lucas, 35 Kan. App. 2d 858, 867-68, 136 P.3d 484 (2006).

The district court did not abuse its discretion on this issue. The imposition of a constructive trust generally requires a showing of actual or constructive fraud. See Nelson v. Nelson,

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

Related

Wayne L. Ryan Revocable Trust v. Ryan
308 Neb. 851 (Nebraska Supreme Court, 2021)
In re K.J.S.
Court of Appeals of Kansas, 2020
Bailey v. State
Court of Appeals of Kansas, 2017
PESTRIKOFF v. Hoff
278 P.3d 281 (Alaska Supreme Court, 2012)
Lewis v. R & K Ranch, L.L.C.
204 P.3d 642 (Court of Appeals of Kansas, 2009)
In Re the Estate of Lane
188 P.3d 23 (Court of Appeals of Kansas, 2008)

Cite This Page — Counsel Stack

Bluebook (online)
188 P.3d 23, 39 Kan. App. 2d 1062, 2008 Kan. App. LEXIS 115, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/in-re-the-estate-of-lane-kanctapp-2008.