Woman did destroy £800k will on her deathbed, court rules

An elderly woman who caused a dramatic court fight when she ripped up her £800,000 will on her deathbed did validly destroy the document, a judge has ruled.

Carry Keats, 92, physically ripped three-quarters of the way through the pages of her will during her final illness in hospital, in 2022.

Her final act led to a huge family drama — pitting her five distant cousins against her younger sister — with whom she was said to have had a 'love-hate relationship.'

Under the terms of the will the five cousins would have inherited the fortune, but if the will was found to have been legally destroyed, then her younger sister Josephine Oakley, known as Jo, would take it all. 

A Victorian law passed in 1837 states any person can legally revoke a will they have made by ripping it up, so long as the act is carried out within certain guidelines. 

Ms Oakley's five cousins, headed by David Crew, argued she never would have wanted the money to go to her sister because Carry despaired of Jo's lifestyle. 

But Deputy Master John Linwood today ruled in favour of Mrs Oakley in the landmark case, finding Carry had wished to disinherit the cousins and had done so lawfully.

'In my judgment there was actual tearing combined with intent...Carry did sufficiently destroy the will as it was entirely torn in half as she intended,' he said.

'I find there was a positive communication and not mere acquiescence, as Carry looked at Mrs Webb and responded to her direct offer with a physical command or instruction reflecting her wish that Mrs Webb should actively assist her to complete the tearing in half of the will.'

Mrs Keats' cousins, who would have split most of her fortune under the will, brought a unique court challenge, claiming the dying pensioner did not validly revoke it because she was too weak to rip the document all the way through with her own hands. 

The cousins, headed by David Crew, the son of Mrs Keats and Mrs Oakley's cousin Lucy Whitehorn, said the will should stand, as Mrs Keats was only strong enough to tear it three-quarters of the way through, with the rest being ripped at her request by her solicitor.

They claimed Mrs Keats had wanted to leave her sister nothing and that she didn't have the mental capacity on her deathbed to change her mind about who got her fortune in such a dramatic fashion.

Mr Crew previously told the court: 'They hadn't got on for many years, going back to when they were both young.

'Jo had a messy life. Her first husband divorced her over her infidelity.

'Carry was an upstanding country woman with a high moral code.

'Not only did her first husband leave her for adultery but her second husband divorced her as well for reasons we do not know'.

They also argued that Mrs Keats' non-verbal 'nod' to her solicitor Hafwen Webb to approve her completing the tearing of the will had not been enough to satisfy the law that she was happy for the destruction of the will to be completed by her.

Mrs Oakley however insisted her sister knew what she was doing and had decided to cut out her cousins after they proposed putting 'proud and independent New Forester' Mrs Keats into a nursing home.

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Turning to Mrs Keats' motivation for her dramatic change of mind, the judge referenced the 'fatal' falling out with her cousins over the care home proposal and quoting a judge's comments from an 1821 will dispute added: 'It is one of the painful consequences of extreme old age that it ceases to excite interest and is apt to be left solitary and neglected.

'The control which the law gives to a man to dispose of his property is one of the most efficient means which he has in protracted life to command the attentions due to his infirmities.'

He added: 'Nothing in human nature has changed over the last 200 years since that was said, nor I presume will it in the future.'

The High Court heard that Carry Keats died, aged 92, on 15 February 2022, less than three weeks after tearing up her last will as she lay dying in hospital in Salisbury.

Mrs Keats, who owned and ran a successful caravan site, left behind an £800,000 fortune, mainly tied up in her home and land at 'Carron' in the Wiltshire village of Nomansland.

Eighteen months earlier, she had made a will which split almost everything she owned between five distant cousins of hers, one of whom - David Crew, her cousin once removed - had been close friends with her and her late husband for decades.

The other four were David's sister Angela Crew, plus cousins twice removed Kevin, Jason and Leon Whitehorn.

However, towards the end of her life, she grew closer to her younger sister Josephine - nine years her junior - with whom the court heard she had a 'love-hate relationship'.

The court heard Josephine Oakley say that she took her sister roast dinners every Sunday whilst she was still at home during her last years and visited her in hospital almost every day during her final illness.

During the same period Mrs Keats - who was described in the judgment as 'stubborn' with old-fashioned views, a 'feisty old bird' and a 'self sufficient resilient and proud New Forester' - fell out with David Crew and his sister Angela 'after they indicated that they were going to put her in a nursing home if she had another fall,' Mrs Oakley's lawyers told the judge.

These changes in the family dynamics led to a dramatic scene in January 2022, involving the ailing Mrs Keats sending for her longtime lawyer Hafwen Webb as she lay in her deathbed in Salisbury Hospital and tearing her will in front of her.

Simon Sinnatt, for the cousins, told the judge that, under the Wills Act 1837, for the destruction of the will to be valid Mrs Keats had to either intentionally fully destroy the will herself or properly authorise her solicitor to do so.

'Did the deceased sufficiently destroy the will? Did the deceased authorise Hafwen Webb to complete the destruction or acquiesce in the same? Did the deceased have the requisite intention to destroy the will? If the will was revoked, did the deceased have the mental capacity to do so?' he said.

'The completion of the tearing by Hafwen Webb raises a problem which potentially invalidates her completion of the process for lack of authority,' he said.

But, finding that the will was legally destroyed with Mrs Keats' authority, the judge in his ruling today said:

'This claim concerns whether the deceased had sufficient mental capacity to make a deathbed revocation of her will by tearing it in half, thereby causing her estate to pass by intestacy to her sister, Mrs Josephine Oakley, as opposed to the other parties to this claim, who are, unlike her, beneficiaries under the will.

'In other words, it is all or nothing for Mrs Oakley or those other parties.

'Behind this simple act of tearing is enmity in the wider family involving allegations of undue influence, greed and bullying, with an unseemly scrabble for the assets of the deceased in the last couple of years of her life and after her death'.

He added that the turning point in Mrs Keats' testamentary intentions was, as Josephine's lawyers had argued, 'a serious falling out between Carry and the Crews' over them 'proposing to put her in a nursing home if she had another fall'.

'Carry knew her own mind,' the judge went on.

'It is pellucidly clear from the evidence of Mrs Webb that Carry understood her entire estate would pass to her sister.

'The strong desire to exclude and disinherit the Crews was clear from her instructions two months before at their meeting on 16th November 2021

'I find that Carry had a sufficiently lucid interval during which the revocation took place...I find Carry had capacity in that narrow window'.

In relation to the 'nod' with which she indicated her solicitor should finish treating through the will, the judge said:

'In these facts and circumstances, I find there was a positive communication and not mere acquiescence, as Carry looked at Mrs Webb and responded to her direct offer with a physical command or instruction reflecting her wish that Mrs Webb should actively assist her to complete the tearing in half of the Will.

'I think it would be artificial not to permit a testator to communicate as they wished in those circumstances at that time.

'The communication must be positive and discernible, which I find the nod is in these factual circumstances and it may be non-verbal, as here.

'Carry properly authorised Mrs Webb to complete the destruction of the will for the reasons above. Her nod was not a mere acquiescence but a positive and discernible non-verbal communication.

'In my judgment there was actual tearing combined with intent.

'Carry did sufficiently destroy the will as it was entirely torn in half as she intended.

'In summary I find Carry had testamentary capacity to revoke the will, the intention to do so and revoked it by destruction in accordance with the Wills Act 1837.

'I therefore dismiss the claim and find for Josephine on her counterclaim,' the judge concluded.