Title: In Re Estate of Rask

State: north-dakota

Issuer: North Dakota Supreme Court

Document:

214 N.W.2d 525 (1974) In the Matter of the ESTATE of Erick RASK, Deceased. Myrtle ATHEY, Appellant, v. Theodore RASK et al., Appellees. Civ. No. 8915. Supreme Court of North Dakota. February 1, 1974. *526 C. J. Schauss, Mandan, for appellant. Richard P. Gallagher, Mandan, for appellees. PAULSON, Judge. This is an appeal from a judgment of the Morton County District Court affirming a decree of the County Court of Morton *527 County which denied admission to probate of the purported Last Will and Testament of Erick Rask, Deceased. This is the second time this case has been before this court. In re Rask's Estate, 177 N.W.2d 287 (N.D.1970). In April of 1967, Theodore C. Rask, the executor of the estate of Erick Rask, filed a petition in Morton County Court for the proof and probate of the will of the deceased, Erick Rask. On May 24, 1967, an answer and objections to the probate of that will was filed in Morton County Court by the various brothers, sisters, nephews, and nieces of Erick Rask. The contestants to the will claimed that Erick Rask did not have sufficient mental capacity to make and execute a will. On January 23, 1968, the Morton County Court held that the deceased, Erick Rask, lacked testamentary capacity at the time of the execution of his will because he was suffering from insane delusions. On January 27, 1968, the Morton County Court issued its judgment and decree denying probate to the will of Erick Rask. On February 28, 1968, Myrtle Athey, the sole beneficiary of the will of Erick Rask, filed a notice of appeal from the county court's decision to the District Court of Morton County. On June 19, 1972, the district court entered its order for judgment which affirmed the Morton County Court. On August 17, 1972, Myrtle Athey filed her notice of appeal to this court. We consider the Statement of Facts prepared by the district court to be exhaustive and adopt it as our own. Those facts, as stated by the district court, are: From these facts the district court found that the deceased, Erick Rask, was suffering from or afflicted with an insane delusion that he was a married man and had children; that he had been adjudged insane in 1914; that in truth and in fact Erick Rask was never married; that he had no children; that Myrtle Athey was not his daughter; that Erick Rask was unquestionably motivated by and was acting under the influence of such insane delusion when he executed his will making Myrtle Athey his sole beneficiary; and that the will was a direct offspring, product, or result of the insane delusion and controlled the disposition of his property. From its findings, the district court concluded: Myrtle Athey appeals from the district court's judgment and sets forth the following issues for review: In Kingdon v. Sybrant, 158 N.W.2d 863 (N.D.1968), we held, in paragraphs 1 and 2 of the syllabus: From the Kingdon case, it is evident that the question of whether a testator is laboring under an insane delusion which materially affects the will is a question of fact. The instant case was tried to the court without a jury and, therefore, the district court's findings of fact will be governed by Rule 52(a) of the North Dakota Rules of Civil Procedure, which provides, in pertinent part: In 1914, Erick Rask, the testator in this case, was found to be insane by the insanity board of Morton County, on the ground of his belief that he was married and the father of a child, neither of which was true. Thereafter he was committed to the State Hospital in Jamestown, where the examining physician reported that Erick Rask was laboring under the false delusion that he had a wife and family. The examining physician also found that Erick Rask's mental frailties were apparently precipitated in 1910 from the effects of a bolt of lightning which struck near him. During the year and a half that Erick Rask spent at the State Hospital, it is reasonable to assume that he received treatment for the delusion from which he suffered. In 1924, after having served in the Armed Forces, Erick was placed under guardianship, and he remained under guardianship until his death on April 11, 1967. When Erick caused his will to be written, he told the scrivener to leave the bulk of his property to his "daughter", Myrtle Athey. This desire on Erick's part made it apparent that the treatment he had received at the State Hospital had not been successful, and that Erick had been laboring under the same delusion of fatherhood for about fifty-two years. The rule is well established that a single person may leave his property to whom he chooses, and that brothers and sisters are not natural objects of a testator's bounty. In re Bratcher's Estate, 76 N.D. 194, 34 N.W.2d 825 (1948). See Stormon v. Weiss, 65 N.W.2d 475 (N.D.1954). If Erick Rask had had a longstanding and close relationship with Myrtle Athey and if such relationship had been on a continuous basisinstead of involving a fifty-year break as it does in this casethen we would have no difficulty in understanding that Erick would desire to will his property to her. The circumstances of this case, however, make it evident that Erick believed that he was the father of Myrtle Athey, and that, by his will, he disposed of the bulk of his property to her because of that belief. The evidence in this case clearly establishes that there was no factual basis for Erick's belief that Myrtle Athey is his daughter. We believe that the evidence fails to establish even a probability of Erick's fatherhood, because, at the time Myrtle Athey was born, Erick was fourteen years and five months of age. Myrtle Athey was born in Hebron, and prior to and at the time of her birth, Erick was living with his parents on a farm south of Mandan. The record discloses that at the time of Myrtle's conception Erick had no opportunity to associate with Myrtle's mother. In Kee v. Redlin, 203 N.W.2d 423 (N.D.1972), we held in paragraph 5 of the syllabus: In this, as in all trials, the trial court has the opportunity to judge of the credibility of the witnesses on a firsthand basis. The trial court's findings, inferences, and conclusions are based on such firsthand knowledge, and we therefore give great weight to those determinations. In our perusal of the record in the instant case, unless we can say from the evidence that the trial court's findings are clearly erroneous, we cannot set those findings aside under our Rule 52(a), N.D.R.Civ.P. Applying this rule to the case at bar, we are unable to say that the findings of fact made by the trial court are clearly erroneous. The judgment of the district court is, therefore, affirmed. ERICKSTAD, C. J., and TEIGEN, VOGEL and KNUDSON, JJ., concur.