Court Opinion

ID: 9549623
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-07 18:22:22.735792+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T15:20:38.099799
License: Public Domain

HALLEY, V.C.J.
(dissenting). I am not unappreciative of the efforts of those who prepared the majority opinion, but I am firmly of the view that such opinion reaches the wrong conclusion.
In the first place, the trial court submitted to the jury the question of whether or not a family relationship existed between the plaintiff and the two brothers of her deceased husband, when the evidence shows conclusively that there was a family relationship, and there was no evidence to the contrary. For a definition of a “family” see In re Smith’s Estate, 202 Okla. 302, 213 P. 2d 284. There was no question for the jury to pass upon.
In' the second place, the opinion, while laying down a correct principle of law that “the presumption that the furnishing of necessary services to a relative is gratuitous in the absence of an express contract for payment therefor is a rebuttable one”, fails to point out in the evidence where this presumption is rebutted, and the defendant in error’s' brief also fails to point out any such evidence, and after a thorough search I am unable to find any evidence that rebuts this presumption in the slightest degree.
Clearly the demurrer to the evidence should have been sustained.
I do not contend that simply because the plaintiff was the sister-in-law of the deceased and was living in his home, she must prove an express contract for compensation, although there is respectable authority to sustain such a view. See Hatfield’s Estate, 50 Pa. Sup. 450; In re Patterson’s Estate, 25 Pa. Dist. & Co. 364; Zuhn v. Horst, 100 Wash. 359, 170 P. 1033. I do maintain, however, that when the evidence shows —as in this case — that the plaintiff and defendant were living together in a family relationship, the plaintiff must prove facts and circumstances which rebut the presumption of gratuity which obtains in such cases. See Schultz v. Andrus’s Estate, 178 Wis. 358, 190 N. W. 83, and 34 C. J. S., Executors and Administrators §371, p. 114.
The only semblance of testimony from which a contract could be inferred was that one witness testified that the blind brother said he wanted all that belonged to him to go to the plaintiff, and another witness testified that Charlie Rogers told her “that I told Audrey we would get busy and install us a bathroom so she could and we all could enjoy that now, and as to Audrey could have it after I am gone.” The same witness, Mrs. Melencamp, testified that the. blind brother, Charlie, made the statement after plaintiff returned from *666a week’s visit to her daughter in Dallas: “Jessie, I have asked Audrey to stay on with us”, and “We are very happy about it.” And then, on a leading question, the witness testified: “Yes, she agreed to stay on and he was very happy.” I think that, as is said in 34 C. J. S., Executors and Administrators, §371, p. 108, decedent’s mere expressions of gratitude or of a desire to compensate, or of an indefinite intention to compensate in the future, fall short of establishing a contract for payment. See Gayheart’s Adm’r v. Gayheart, 287 Ky. 720, 155 S. W. 2d 1.
There also is no evidence whatsoever that these conversations were transmitted to the plaintiff. Even if these were enough, which they are not, that would have been necessary. See Kleinberg v. Kinealy, Mo. App., 193 S. W. 981.
There is no evidence that the plaintiff ever made any demand for compensation during the lifetime of the decedent, and the failure to do so raises a presumption that the services were gratuitous. See Logan v. Hite, 214 Ind. 233, 13 N. E. 702.
This is a law action, and we should not be concerned with doing equity. This old lady, the plaintiff, is no doubt a worthy person, but she did not do so badly in the little over four years that she lived with her brothers-in-law after her husband’s death. She had a home which she enjoyed, her flock of chickens and herd of cattle, the .companionship of men to whom she was devoted, and the independence and dignity that came, from doing what she wanted to and rendering service. In addition, she received a gift of $1,600; and her children will inherit one-fourth of the estate of Charlie Rogers. But all this' is beside the point, for under the evidence she was a member of the family of the Rogers brothers and performed her services without the promise or expectation of a reward.. I think that a reading of secs. 371(a) and (b) (5); 452(d) (2); 784(a) (2) (b); 784 (b) (3) (b); 785(b) (2); 786 (b) (3); and 788, in 34 C. J. S., Executors and Administrators, and some of the cases cited thereunder, will convince one that the majority opinion is wrong. I dissent.