Court Opinion

ID: 9855003
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-09-24 06:18:10.60152+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T09:23:38.456684
License: Public Domain

Benham, Chief Justice,
dissenting.
I agree fully with the first division of the majority opinion, and I believe the evidence submitted on motion for summary judgment would, in a trial, support a verdict for the Scarbroughs. I do not believe, however, that they are entitled to judgment as a matter of law, so I must dissent from the majority opinion’s affirmance of the trial court’s grant of summary judgment on the issue of waste.
As the majority opinion correctly notes, the question of waste is generally one for a jury. Wright v. Conner, 200 Ga. 413 (37 SE2d 353) (1946). That is especially so in a case such as the present one where there is evidence presented in defense of the life estate to the effect that any damage to the estate has been unintentional and due to the circumstances of the holder of the life estate rather than from disregard of the estate. In its fifth headnote, Wright adopts from Roby v. Newton, 121 Ga. 679, 683 (49 SE 694) (1905), the analysis of the statute now codified as OCGA § 44-6-83. In Roby, this Court noted that, as forfeitures are not favored, the statute must be strictly construed, as a criminal statute must be. The court went on to construe the statute as requiring a concurrence of permissive (lack of due care) and voluntary (active) waste, and held that the waste which would authorize forfeiture must be committed “in such a manner as to indicate an utter disregard of the rights of those who are thereafter to take.”
In the present case, there is evidence that Ms. McIntyre has made some efforts, through the agency of her son, to reverse the deterioration of the property and that she has been ill and unable to care *827for the property adequately, although she has always intended to return to it. That evidence, if believed, does not show the wilful behavior required to warrant a forfeiture. The evidence offered in favor of forfeiture does not demand, as a matter of law, a finding of wilfulness. As this Court noted in Grimm v. Grimm, 153 Ga.. 655, 659 (113 SE 91) (1922), “if the life-tenant from poverty or inability to keep the premises from falling into decay, allowed them to get in such condition, such conduct would be merely permissive, and would not be voluntary
Decided May 28, 1996 —
Reconsideration denied June 28, 1996.
Robert E. Andrews, for appellant.
Hunt, Coleman, Vaughan & Chambers, Donald T. Hunt, Christopher E. Vaughan, Jennifer C. Bagwell, for appellees.
“The question of intent . . . fits the pattern of those issues of material fact which are not appropriate issues for summary judgment but are decided by the trier of fact. [Cit.]” State Farm Fire &c. Co. v. Morgan, 258 Ga. 276 (368 SE2d 509) (1988). The question of whether Ms. McIntyre’s conduct with regard to the life estate she holds has been so egregiously wasteful as to warrant forfeiture of her interest in the property should be submitted to a jury. I must, therefore, dissent to the affirmance of the trial court’s grant of summary judgment on that issue.
I am authorized to state that Justice Hunstein and Justice Carley join in this dissent.