Matter of Estate of Flaherty

446 N.W.2d 760, 1989 N.D. LEXIS 189, 1989 WL 110909
CourtNorth Dakota Supreme Court
DecidedSeptember 26, 1989
DocketCiv. 880358
StatusPublished
Cited by11 cases

This text of 446 N.W.2d 760 (Matter of Estate of Flaherty) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering North Dakota Supreme Court primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
Matter of Estate of Flaherty, 446 N.W.2d 760, 1989 N.D. LEXIS 189, 1989 WL 110909 (N.D. 1989).

Opinions

MESCHKE, Justice.

Norine Feldner was the principal beneficiary of the will of her brother, John J. Flaherty, deceased. She appealed from a jury verdict and judgment declaring that his will was an invalid product of an insane delusion. We affirm.

FACTS

John J. Flaherty and Bessie Rock met at a dance in the summer of 1937 when he was 32 and she was 18. Bessie testified that John J. was her first date and her first sexual partner. Bessie became pregnant. John J. and Bessie married and moved in with his parents, Martin and Emma, on March 21, 1938. John H. Flaherty, son of John J. and Bessie, was born on April 12, 1938.

After that, Bessie and the baby slept in John J.’s room, but John J. slept in Emma’s room while Martin slept on the couch. Emma insisted on this arrangement because she did not want Bessie and John J. sleeping together. Emma also insisted that John J. not play with the baby nor help care for him.

When John H. was three months old, John J. took Bessie and the baby to her parents’ home, saying that he would get them in about a week. John J. never returned for Bessie and John H.

Bessie wrote several letters to John J. His only response was a request for blood tests when the baby was about six months old. The tests showed that John J. and Bessie had type A positive blood and that their baby, John H., had type 0 positive. By medical standards of that time, these blood types evidenced that John J. could have been the father of John H.

In 1939, John J. sued for an annulment. Bessie sought child support. Eventually, in 1941, Bessie gave up and agreed to annulment of their marriage.

When John H. grew up, he unsuccessfully tried to communicate with John J. John H., his wife, and children would sometimes visit John J.’s sister, Violet, in a nursing home. Although other relatives of John J. encouraged these visits, they disturbed John J. Also, at several chance meetings, John J. ranted to John H.’s wife and to his daughter because he felt their presence implied that he was father of John H.

John J. began telling people that he could not possibly be John H.’s father. Over the years, John J. claimed that he had never been married to Bessie, that blood tests proved he was not the father, and that he had used a white handkerchief as a contraceptive. In his lifetime, John J. wrote four different wills, each making his sister, No-rine Feldner, beneficiary of nearly half of his estate. Also, each of these wills expressly disinherited John H.

When John J. died in 1986, John H. contested the wills, claiming they were invalid because John J. had an insane delusion that John H. was not his son. The trial court dismissed the contest petition, believing that the 1941 annulment judgment “established that [John H.] was not the son of [John J.].” John H. appealed. We reversed, ruling that John H. was not a party to the 1941 annulment and “his interests were not represented therein.” Flaherty v. Feldner, 419 N.W.2d 908, 910 (N.D.1988). Res judicata did not bar John H.’s rights.

At the jury trial on remand, a psychiatric expert for John H. testified that John J. was suffering from a “induced psychotic [762]*762disorder” or “shared paranoid delusion,” a form of double insanity where a dominant person develops an insane delusion and passes it on to a submissive partner. This expert testified that John J. was dominated by Emma, his mother, that she developed and gave him the delusion that John H. was not his son, and that, after his mother’s death, out of loyalty to her, John J. continued to reject his son.

Another psychiatric expert, testifying for Feldner, rejected the idea of a “shared paranoid delusion” because the disorder was so rare and because all of its traits did not seem clearly present in John J.’s relationship with Emma, his mother. This expert suggested that the annulment and rumors may have given John J. some basis for his belief.1

The jury decided that John H. was John J.’s son and that John J. had an insane delusion that he was not. The trial court entered a judgment declaring that all four wills were invalid and that John H. was John J.’s son and sole heir.

Feldner appealed. She claimed that the trial court mistakenly instructed the jury about an insane delusion and about the presumption of sanity, that the trial court erred in allowing and excluding evidence, and that there was insufficient evidence of an insane delusion shared between John J. and Emma, his mother.

INSANE DELUSION

The trial court did not give, verbatim, a lengthy instruction requested by Feldner:

“There is a presumption that a testator was sane at the time of the execution of his will. Where one is contesting proof of a will on the basis that the testator was suffering from an insane delusion, it is not sufficient to introduce evidence which tends to prove the testator was possessed of such a delusion, there must be further proof by the contestant that the delusion has no foundation in fact or in probability in order to show that the delusion is wholly a product of the imagination.
“Therefore, you are instructed that if there is any evidence, although slight or inconclusive, which may have contributed to John J. Flaherty’s beliefs regarding John H. Flaherty, Jr. and his reasons for omitting him from his Will, the testator’s belief is not a delusion. The question of whether John H. Flaherty, Jr. is the testator’s son is not an issue with regards to determining whether the testator suffered from an insane delusion, because regardless of whether or not John H. Flaherty, Jr. was actually his son, the issue is whether or not there was any evidence which may have contributed to the testator’s belief for omitting him from the Will.
“Furthermore, you are instructed that in addition to proving that the testator suffered from an insane delusion, it is not enough that the contestant prove that the testator was a victim of such delusion, the contestant must also prove that the Will itself was a product of that delusion and that the testator divides up his property in a way which, except for that delusion, he would not have done. “Therefore, to invalidate this Will on the basis that it was a product of an insane delusion, the contestant must prove all of the following facts:
“1. That John J. Flaherty suffered from a delusion that had no foundation in fact or probability, and was wholly a product of imagination;
“2. That John J. Flaherty suffered from this delusion at the time he signed the Will;
[763]*763“3. That he would not have drafted his Will in this manner, except for the delusion.”

Instead, the trial court instructed on the nature of an insane delusion, as follows:

“An insane delusion is insanity upon a single subject. An insane delusion renders the person afflicted incapable of reasoning upon that particular subject. He assumes to believe that to be true which has no reasonable foundation in fact on which to base his belief. A person persistently believing supposed facts which have no real existence against all evidence and probability, and conducting himself upon the assumption of their existence, is so far as such facts are concerned, under an insane delusion.

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Cite This Page — Counsel Stack

Bluebook (online)
446 N.W.2d 760, 1989 N.D. LEXIS 189, 1989 WL 110909, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/matter-of-estate-of-flaherty-nd-1989.