Court Opinion

ID: 9683809
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-24 13:37:14.813314+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T18:17:50.377338
License: Public Domain

DAVID GAULTNEY, Justice,
dissenting.
I respectfully dissent. Under section 243 of the Texas Probate Code, an award of reasonable attorney’s fees to a person named as an executor in a will is mandatory, whether or not the will is admitted to probate, if the action seeking to probate the will is prosecuted in good faith and with just cause. See Tex. Prob.Code Ann. § 243 (Vernon 2003). I agree with the trial court that good faith and just cause are established as a matter of law under the unusual circumstances presented in this case.
Rice was named as the independent executor in the last will Frenchie signed — a will executed less than a year before his death. Frenchie’s last will gave Artie one dollar. After Frenchie’s death, Artie applied for an independent administration of the estate; he asserted Frenchie died without a will. Artie would then be the sole heir of Frenchie’s estate. Rice was the person Frenchie named in his last will to serve as independent executor of his estate. In my view, to not offer the copy of that will for probate under these unusual circumstances would have been a neglect of the responsibility entrusted to him. I would affirm the trial court’s judgment.