2024 IL App (2d) 230602-U No. 2-23-0602 Order filed August 7, 2024
NOTICE: This order was filed under Supreme Court Rule 23(b) and is not precedent except in the limited circumstances allowed under Rule 23(e)(1). ______________________________________________________________________________
IN THE
APPELLATE COURT OF ILLINOIS
SECOND DISTRICT ______________________________________________________________________________
In re THE ESTATE OF RONALD KRAMER, ) Appeal from the Circuit Court Deceased ) of Kane County. ) ) No. 20-P-232 (Sandy A. Kramer, as Executor of the Estate, ) Petitioner-Appellee, v. Diane E. Kramer, ) Honorable Respondent-Appellant, Kathy Kokoruz and ) Joseph M. Grady, Samuel Kramer, Respondents.) ) Judge, Presiding. ______________________________________________________________________________
JUSTICE SCHOSTOK delivered the judgment of the court. Presiding Justice McLaren and Justice Mullen concurred in the judgment.
ORDER
¶1 Held: Trial court erred in estopping wife from renouncing her husband’s will.
¶2 After the will of the decedent, Ronald Kramer, was admitted to probate, the decedent’s
wife, Diane E. Kramer, filed a renunciation of the will pursuant to section 2-8 of the Probate Act
(755 ILCS 5/2-8 (West 2018)). The executor of the decedent’s estate, his daughter Sandy A.
Kramer, filed a motion seeking to dismiss or estop the renunciation. The trial court granted the
motion to estop and later denied Diane’s motion to reconsider. Diane now appeals, arguing that
there was no legal basis for the trial court’s orders. We vacate the orders and remand.
¶3 I. BACKGROUND 2024 IL App (2d) 230602-U
¶4 Diane was the decedent’s third wife. The decedent’s only children were the three children
from his first marriage: Sandy (the executor) and the respondents Kathy Kokoruz and Samuel
Kramer. During their marriage, the primary asset owned by the decedent and Diane was their
home in Batavia, which was held in joint tenancy.
¶5 In 2017, Diane moved out of the home. In March 2019, Diane filed a petition for
dissolution of marriage. In October 2019, Diane severed the joint tenancy by transferring her one-
half interest in the Batavia home into a trust through a quitclaim deed. In November 2019, Diane’s
attorney sent a letter to the decedent’s attorney with notice of the transfer and a copy of the deed.
The letter stated that “[t]he filing of this Quit Claim Deed effectively allows each of the parties to
bequeath their respective interests in [the Batavia home] to their children.” The letter contained
no reference to the statutory right of a spouse to renounce a will.
¶6 The decedent died a few months later, on January 23, 2020. At the time of his death, he
and Diane were still married, as no judgment of dissolution had been entered.
¶7 In May 2020, Sandy petitioned to admit the will to probate and issue letters of office
naming her as executor. The petition stated that the decedent’s ownership of one-half of the
Batavia home was the primary asset of the estate, along with personal property with an estimated
value of about $10,000. The affidavit of heirship listed the decedent’s three children, but not his
wife Diane, as heirs under the will.
¶8 The executor was unable to locate and produce an original of the most recent will, which
was dated January 2, 2020 (21 days before the decedent’s death). Instead, the executor submitted
a copy of the purported will along with affidavits from two witnesses attesting to its authenticity.
The will, a fairly simple three-page document, named Sandy as executor and left her the entire
estate. The will expressly disinherited the other two children, Kathy and Samuel, “[d]ue to prior
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generosity shown” by the decedent. Other than stating that the decedent was “currently going
through a divorce” to an unnamed person, the will did not mention Diane. The trial court admitted
the will to probate and entered an order of heirship that listed Diane in addition to the three
children.
¶9 On June 18, 2020, Diane filed a timely renunciation of the will. In July 2020, Kathy and
Samuel filed a petition challenging the authenticity of the purported will.
¶ 10 According to the executor, the parties began discussing settlement of their disputes about
the will in August 2020. A proposed settlement agreement among the three children was drafted
under which “[t]he parties anticipated” that Diane would withdraw her renunciation of the will,
Kathy and Samuel would dismiss their challenge to the purported will, and the estate would be
divided equally among the three children after the payment of costs. A court order dated August
13, 2020, stated that the three children had “resolved the issues relating to [the will] by way of
settlement.” The trial court continued the case several times for status on the settlement, and Kathy
and Samuel signed the agreement in February 2021. However, the executor offered various
reasons for refusing to sign it and never did so.
¶ 11 In June 2021, Kathy and Samuel moved to enforce the settlement agreement, asserting that
the executor had agreed to the settlement but then failed to execute the agreement. The executor’s
September 2021 response asserted that Diane was a necessary party to any settlement.
¶ 12 In October 2021, both the executor and Diane signed a contract to list the Batavia home
for sale. The house was sold and the estate received $341,732.70 for its one-half interest in the
home, with Diane’s trust receiving the remainder.
¶ 13 According to the executor, in February 2022 Diane’s attorney e-mailed the attorney for the
estate with a “proposal for settlement,” under which a full and complete inventory would be filed,
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Diane would not object to Sandy’s reasonable and necessary expenses, and the net estate would
be divided equally among the three children. A settlement agreement among Diane and the three
children was drafted. However, the executor did not sign this agreement either.
¶ 14 In June 2022, Kathy and Samuel filed objections (later amended) to the executor’s report
of inventory and accounting, asserting that the executor had improperly disbursed funds for her
own benefit and had failed to list any of the decedent’s financial assets.
¶ 15 So far as the record reveals, as of the end of 2023, the trial court had not yet ruled on Kathy
and Samuel’s challenge to the purported will, their motion to enforce the settlement, or their
objections to the inventory and accounting, and the will had not been proven.
¶ 16 In March 2023, the executor filed a motion to dismiss or estop Diane’s renunciation of the
will. In it, she asserted that “all parties” agreed that they would settle their various disputes and
that Diane would withdraw her renunciation, but then in January or February of 2023, Diane’s
attorney advised the executor that Diane no longer agreed to withdraw the renunciation. The
executor argued that Diane should be estopped from renouncing the will because (1) the decedent
and the executor had relied on the November 2019 letter stating that the partition of the Batavia
home through the quitclaim deed “allow[ed] each of the parties to bequeath their respective
interests in” the home to their children, and (2) the executor had relied on Diane’s offers to settle. 1
1 The executor also argued that Diane’s renunciation should be “dismissed” as defective in
form because it did not attach any statement from her attorney pursuant to Illinois Supreme Court
Rule 137 (eff. Jan. 1, 2018). However, the trial court did not rule on this argument and, on appeal,
the executor has abandoned it.
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¶ 17 Diane argued in response that (1) the November 2019 letter did not contain any promise
that Diane would not exercise her statutory right to renounce the will should the occasion arise,
(2) the executor herself had refused to enter into any of the settlement agreements and thus could
not assert any reliance on them, and (3) the executor had not identified any loss or detriment
suffered by the estate that was caused by the alleged reliance on the letter or the settlement offers.
Diane attached affidavits from herself and her attorney averring that at no time during settlement
negotiations or the process of selling the Batavia house did either of them make any promises to
the executor or the estate, or enter into any agreement with the estate apart from the listing and
sales contracts.
¶ 18 The executor subsequently filed both an amended motion and a reply in support of her
motion. The reply included an affidavit from the decedent’s brother, a lawyer who had drafted the
decedent’s January 2, 2020, will, stating among other things that “[a]t the time of the drafting of
said Last Will and Testament and the execution of the Last Will and Testament it was never
contemplated that DIANE KRAMER would ever consider Renouncing the Last Will and
Testament of RONALD N. KRAMER.”
¶ 19 On July 19, 2023, without holding a hearing or oral arguments, the trial court entered an
order granting the executor’s motion to estop Diane:
“The Court finds that there is sufficient basis in the Pleadings and Documents relating to
the Renunciation of the Will filed by DIANE E. KRAMER to enter an Order Estopping
DIANE KRAMER from asserting the Renunciation of the Will and DIANE KRAMER is
hereby Estopped from asserting the Renunciation of the Will previously filed on June 18,
2022 [sic].”
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The order included a finding pursuant to Illinois Supreme Court Rule 304(a) (eff. Mar. 8, 2016)
that the order was final and there was no just reason to delay appeal of the order. On November
29, 2023, the trial court denied Diane’s motion to reconsider and clarify the order, stating that it
remembered the case and further stating:
“I think that when the property was sold, and she got the portion of the proceeds
from the real estate, I think she’s there. Plus I also saw the interaction of the parties, by
and through their attorneys.
I think that she is estopped from claiming it. I’m not going to change anything.”
Diane then filed this timely appeal.
¶ 20 II. ANALYSIS
¶ 21 The right of a surviving spouse to renounce a will and instead take a specified share of the
estate, codified in section 2-8 of the Probate Act (755 ILCS 5/2-8 (West 2018)), has long roots in
the law. It is designed to make the welfare of the surviving spouse paramount, allowing the spouse
to decide which “method of taking”—under the will, or under the statute—“would be most
advantageous to him or her.” In re Donovan’s Estate, 409 Ill. 195, 202 (1951). The right to
renounce is firmly established: “if competent, the survivor has an absolute right to renounce the
will of the deceased spouse by filing a renunciation.” First Nat’l Bank of Danville v. McMillan,
12 Ill. 2d 61, 66-67 (1957). Nevertheless, there are circumstances in which courts have estopped
a renunciation, including where the spouses entered into a prenuptial or antenuptial contract under
which the surviving spouse agreed not to renounce (see generally In re Estate of Feinberg, 234 Ill.
2d 256 (2009); Kirchner v. Morrison, 320 Ill. 236 (1927)), or where the surviving spouse accepted
benefits under the will that were inconsistent with renunciation (see Hunter v. DeMay, 124 Ill.
App. 2d 429 (1970) (surviving spouse was estopped from renouncing deceased wife’s will where
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he lived on the property bequeathed to him under the will “for a considerable period of time, after
his wife’s death, in a manner consistent with an intent to accept the provisions of the will,” and
eventually sold the property to a third party)). However, estoppel of a spouse’s statutory right of
renunciation cannot be sustained “except upon the clearest and most convincing evidence.”
Golden v. Golden, 393 Ill. 536, 541 (1946).
¶ 22 In this case, the only reasons given by the trial court for its determination that Diane should
be estopped from renouncing the will were that (1) she received a payment following the sale of
the Batavia home, and (2) “the interaction of the parties.” The first of these is not a valid basis for
estoppel, as there is no evidence that Diane’s trust received any more from the sale of the home
than it was due as a prior owner of one-half of the property. 2 Thus, to the extent that the trial
court’s ruling was based on this factor, it lacks support in the record and is contrary to the manifest
weight of the evidence.
¶ 23 As for the second basis cited by the trial court, “the interaction of the parties,” the executor
argues that the trial court’s ruling estopping the renunciation is supported by principles of
promissory estoppel. Diane argues that the executor did not prove the elements of promissory
estoppel, and the imposition of estoppel on other grounds is not supported by legal authority. We
examine each of these arguments in turn.
¶ 24 A. Promissory Estoppel
2 The executor asserts that Diane’s trust received a “disproportionate” share of the sale
proceeds rather than one-half, but she fails to support this assertion, citing only to the allegations
of her own petition, rather than to any evidence in the record. We thus disregard this contention.
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¶ 25 Under certain circumstances, promissory estoppel provides a potential remedy for those
who rely to their detriment on a promise despite the absence of any mutual agreement by the parties
on all the essential terms of a contract. Newton Tractor Sales, Inc. v. Kubota Tractor Corp., 233
Ill. 2d 46, 55 (2009). In this case, in order to establish the elements of promissory estoppel, the
executor must show that: (1) Diane made an unambiguous promise that she would not renounce
the will; (2) the decedent and/or the estate relied on that promise; (3) that reliance was expected
and foreseeable; and (4) Diane’s failure to fulfill the promise caused detriment. Id. at 51. The
executor must also show that the reliance was reasonable and justifiable. Quake Construction,
Inc. v. American Airlines, Inc., 141 Ill. 2d 281, 310 (1990).
¶ 26 The executor cannot meet these requirements. To begin with, the executor cannot point to
any unambiguous promise by Diane that she would not renounce the will. The November 2019
letter merely stated that the partition of the Batavia home allowed the decedent to pass his interest
in the home to his children. This was a simple statement of fact, pointing out that, as the result of
the partition, the decedent had a conveyable interest in the home—an interest that, if the partition
had not occurred, would not exist at all, as under joint tenancy all of the home would have been
transferred to Diane upon the decedent’s death. The letter did not contain any promise that Diane
would refrain from exercising her statutory right to renounce the will, and no such promise can be
construed from the letter.
¶ 27 Further, any reliance on this supposed “promise” was neither reasonable nor justifiable. A
spouse’s right to renounce a will is one of the most widely known principles of the law of wills
and estates. The affidavit by the attorney brother of the decedent, stating that neither he nor the
decedent anticipated that Diane might renounce the will, reveals surprising ignorance of the law
rather than any justifiable reliance.
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¶ 28 The other “promise” identified by the executor was the offer by Diane to enter into a
settlement agreement under which Diane would withdraw her renunciation upon certain terms,
including an equal distribution of the estate among the three children. However, the executor
admits that Diane did not make any unconditional offer to withdraw her renunciation; to the
contrary, the offer was explicitly conditioned on the executor’s acceptance of its terms. The
executor did not accept those terms, and Diane ultimately withdrew her offer to settle. Because
Diane did not promise to withdraw her renunciation without those terms and the executor did not
accept those terms, the executor can neither show any unambiguous promise that Diane breached
nor any reliance thereon.
¶ 29 As the executor cannot show the essential prerequisites of promissory estoppel, the court’s
ruling cannot be upheld under that doctrine.
¶ 30 B. Equitable Estoppel Through Conduct
¶ 31 As Diane acknowledges, courts have sometimes estopped a spouse from renouncing a will
on a different basis, finding that the spouse’s actions demonstrated an intent to waive his or her
right to renounce. This intent can be seen most clearly where a spouse has signed a prenuptial or
antenuptial agreement not to assert a claim against the decedent’s estate. See Golden, 393 Ill. at
540 (a spouse can, through an agreement made during the decedent’s lifetime, effectively waive
the right to renounce the decedent’s will, but such an agreement must be proved by clear and
convincing evidence); see also Kirchner, 320 Ill. at 236 (husband signed an antenuptial contract
specifically releasing all rights to inherit from, or claim a statutory share of, his wife’s estate; the
contract could be enforced despite the wife’s inclusion of a bequest to her husband in her will). It
is undisputed that no such written contract exists here.
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¶ 32 Other less formal conduct by a spouse may also serve as a basis for equitable estoppel.
However, courts have generally been reluctant to abrogate the statutory right to renounce. In
considering whether a surviving spouse should be estopped from renouncing a will, courts consider
whether the spouse’s conduct showed a clear intent to take under the decedent’s will rather than
renounce. Courts also look to whether the spouse has received some benefit from the will that is
inconsistent with renouncing the will.
¶ 33 In Donovan’s Estate, 409 Ill. at 204-09, the supreme court discussed several prior cases
involving claims of estoppel against renunciation, all revealing that spousal conduct rarely
amounts to waiver. For instance, a widow’s acceptance of rents on certain devised property did
not amount to an election to take under the will, because she had an equal right to the rents if she
claimed the property as her share following a renunciation. Id. at 204-05 (discussing
Schaffenacker v. Beil, 320 Ill. 31 (1926)). Nor was a widow’s agreement with the executor to rent
out certain property and the sale of a small amount of personal property a sufficient basis to find
estoppel, as the widow retained no more of the proceeds than the share that she would receive
through renunciation, and thus it could not be said that she had elected to take under the will. Id.
at 205-206 (discussing Canavan v. McNulty, 328 Ill. 388 (1927)). Similarly, the fact that the
surviving spouse served as an executor for the decedent’s estate and sold the decedent’s home did
not amount to an acceptance of the will, as those actions were not inconsistent with the spouse’s
renunciation of his rights under the will. Id. at 207-09.
¶ 34 The actions that the executor claims amount to a waiver of Diane’s right to renounce are
similar to those found insufficient by the supreme court in Donovan’s Estate. As Diane’s trust
owned one-half of the Batavia home, she had an independent right to participate in selling the
home that was entirely separate from any interest through the decedent’s estate. Nor is there any
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evidence that Diane accepted any benefit conferred on her under the will, as in Hunter, 124 Ill.
App. 2d 429. Indeed, as the decedent did not make any bequest to Diane in his will, it cannot be
shown that she took any benefit under the will that would be inconsistent with renunciation. See
Luepker v. Rieso, 119 Ill. App. 3d 62, 66 (1983) (where the estate assets received by the surviving
spouse were of lesser value than the widower’s award he was entitled to, it could not be shown
that he benefitted from the will in any manner that could support estoppel).
¶ 35 The final argument raised by the executor is that it is somehow unfair that Diane is willing
to give up her right to renounce in exchange for a distribution of the estate that includes the
expressly-disinherited children. However, the executor cites no legal authority suggesting that the
owner of a property right—such as the statutory right to renounce—must dispose of that right in a
manner pleasing to the executor. We therefore reject this argument. See Ill. S. Ct. R. 341(h)(7)
(eff. Oct. 1, 2020) (arguments must be supported by citation to legal authority); People ex rel.
Illinois Department of Labor v. E.R.H. Enterprises, Inc., 2013 IL 115106, ¶ 56.
¶ 36 “To work an estoppel, the acts alleged to constitute it must be unequivocally inconsistent
with [the surviving spouse’s] right afterward to renounce the provisions of the will and elect to
take under the statute.” Canavan, 328 Ill. at 395. As the executor cannot show any clear and
convincing evidence supporting the trial court’s imposition of estoppel against Diane, that ruling
is against the manifest weight of the evidence and must be vacated.
¶ 37 III. CONCLUSION
¶ 38 For the reasons stated, the finding of estoppel by the circuit court of Kane County is vacated
and the cause is remanded for further proceedings consistent with this decision.
¶ 39 Order vacated and cause remanded.
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