Court Opinion

ID: 9902476
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-11-27 15:17:42.254241+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T09:21:51.839940
License: Public Domain

FIFTH DISTRICT COURT OF APPEAL
                STATE OF FLORIDA
                 _____________________________

                       Case No. 5D23-608
                 LT Case No. 2018-11957-PRDL
                 _____________________________

STEVEN CHAUNCY,

    Appellant,

    v.

DENNIS LEE GORDEN AND THE
ESTATE OF ADDISON WOOLLEN
MCNAIRY,

    Appellee.
                 _____________________________

On appeal from the Circuit Court for Volusia County.
Margaret W. Hudson, Judge.

Thomas C. Allison, of Thomas C. Allison, P.A., Winter Park, and
Robin F. Hazel, of Hazel Law, P.A., Hollywood, for Appellant.

Jerry B. Wells, of Jerry B. Wells, P.L., Daytona Beach, for
Appellee.

                        November 3, 2023

HARRIS, J.

     Addison McNairy passed away on August 31, 2018. A week
later, Appellant, Steven Chauncy, filed a petition for
administration of the decedent’s estate, seeking to probate a will
McNairy purportedly executed in 2007 (the “2007 Will”). Shortly
thereafter, Appellee, Dennis Gorden, filed an adversarial petition
seeking to probate a will executed by McNairy in 2018 (the “2018
Will”). Each side filed challenges and objections to the other’s will.
Following an evidentiary hearing, the court agreed with Gorden’s
position and found the 2007 Will to be invalid and admitted the
2018 Will to probate. Gorden successfully administered the estate,
and in July 2022, the court granted his petition for discharge.

     Three months later, Chauncy filed a petition to reopen the
estate, alleging that Gorden committed fraud on the court by
failing to disclose the existence of a 1998 will (the “1998 Will”).
Chauncy attached a copy of the 1998 Will to his petition. That will
named two beneficiaries: McNairy’s brother, John, and his friend
and companion, Nelegene Morgan. 1 Specifically, the terms of the
1998 Will provided:

            I do hereby give all my estate to the
            following named 2 person/persons or the
            survivor of them in equal shares:

                 Nelegene Morgan
                 John V. McNairy

Both named beneficiaries predeceased McNairy.

     Gorden moved to dismiss the petition to reopen the estate,
arguing in part that Chauncy lacked standing, as he was not an
interested party under the 1998 Will. Again, the trial court agreed
with Gorden, finding that the use of the word “survivor” in the
1998 Will referred to the survivor of the two persons named in the
will, not the heirs of those persons. Finding that there was no way
to amend the petition to create standing, the court dismissed
Chauncy’s petition with prejudice. This appeal followed.

    “A trial court’s order granting a motion to dismiss with
prejudice is reviewed de novo.” Jordan v. Nienhuis, 203 So. 3d 974,

    1 In his petition, Chauncy claimed to be the son and sole heir

of Nelegene Morgan. Chauncy was not an heir or in any other way
related to the decedent.

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975 (Fla. 5th DCA 2016). Throughout this appeal, the parties have
spent inordinate amounts of time arguing about the fraud
allegations, whether a cause of action was sufficiently pled, and
whether, if allowed to amend his petition, Chauncy could make a
stronger case for fraud. In so doing, short shrift is given to the
court’s more basic and dispositive finding—that Chauncy is not an
interested person under the 1998 Will and therefore he lacks
standing to bring the action to reopen the estate and revoke the
probate of the 2018 Will.

      “[W]hether a person is an ‘interested person’ is an element
that must be established by the petitioner seeking revocation of
probate.” Gordon v. Kleinman, 120 So. 3d 120, 121 (Fla. 4th DCA
2013) (quoting Wehrheim v. Golden Pond Assisted Living Facility,
905 So. 2d 1002, 1006 (Fla. 5th DCA 2005)). Because Appellant
attached a copy of the 1998 Will to his petition to reopen and
revoke probate, the trial court properly considered it in ruling on
the motion to dismiss. See K.R. Exch. Servs., Inc. v. Fuerst,
Humphrey, Ittleman, PL, 48 So. 3d 889, 894 (Fla. 3d DCA 2010)
(“It is well settled that the court must consider an exhibit attached
to the complaint together with the complaint’s allegations, and
that the exhibit controls when its language is inconsistent with the
complaint’s allegations.”). Lack of standing may be considered on
a motion to dismiss if the defense appears on the face of the
complaint or prior pleading. See Wilmington Sav. Fund Soc’y, FSB
v. Contreras, 278 So. 3d 744, 748 (Fla. 5th DCA 2019).

     Chauncy claims that when the 1998 Will left McNairy’s estate
to Nelegene and John “or the survivor of them,” “survivor” means
any heirs of the named beneficiaries, which includes himself as the
son of Nelegene. The court below concluded that Chauncy
incorrectly interprets this provision of the will. We agree. There
was nothing in the will or other circumstances to show that the
word ‘survivor’ intended to be given any meaning other than its
common one. See Porter v. Est. of Myrick, 522 So. 2d 99, 100 (Fla.
3d DCA 1988). Generally, “the word ‘survivor’ should be given its
literal interpretation as meaning one who outlives another, one of
two or more persons who live after the other or others have died.”
Id. (quoting In re Gallop’s Est., 248 So. 2d 686, 688 (Fla. 4th DCA
1971)). The term ‘survivor’ “is limited to the individuals of such a
class, and does not include their children.” Id. Using the term

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‘survivor’ will generally “exclude representatives so that the last
survivor of a class will take the whole share of one dying although
others of the class have all died leaving issue.” Id.

     Because Chauncy is not an interested person as a beneficiary
under the 1998 Will, as he claimed, the trial court properly
dismissed the complaint. And because it conclusively appears that
there is no possible way for Chauncy to now plead his way into
standing, the court did not abuse its discretion in refusing to grant
leave to amend. See Obenschain v. Williams, 750 So. 2d 771, 772–
73 (Fla. 1st DCA 2000).

    AFFIRMED.

BOATWRIGHT, J., concurs.
LAMBERT, J., concurs with opinion.

                  _____________________________

    Not final until disposition of any timely and
    authorized motion under Fla. R. App. P. 9.330 or
    9.331.
               _____________________________

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                                                Case No. 5D23-608
                                     LT Case No. 2018-11957-PRDL

LAMBERT, J., concurring with opinion.

     I fully agree with and thus concur in the majority opinion. As
a matter of common law, because Chauncy’s mother, Nelegene
Morgan, died before the testator, her gift under the 1998 Will
lapsed. See Tubbs v. Teeple, 388 So. 2d 239, 239 (Fla. 2d DCA
1980) (“When a legatee under a will predeceases the benefactor,
the gift lapses.” (citing Drafts v. Drafts, 114 So. 2d 473, 474 (Fla.
1st DCA 1959))).

     Florida does have an “antilapse” statute—codified at section
732.603, Florida Statutes—that, to some extent, ameliorates the
effect of a gift lapsing under the common law; but the statute
provides no relief here to Chauncy. Under the version of section
732.603 in effect when McNairy executed his 1998 Will—or, for
that matter, the current version of the statute—a gift would not
lapse if the predeceased devisee was either the grandparent or the
descendant of a grandparent of the testator.               In such
circumstances, and in the absence of a contrary intent appearing
in the will, the descendants of the predeceased devisee would
receive or inherit per stirpes in place of the deceased devisee. See
§ 732.603(1), Fla. Stat. (1998).

     Morgan, however, is neither the grandparent nor a
descendant of a grandparent of the testator. And with there being
nothing in the 1998 Will to indicate that McNairy intended that
his bequest to Morgan would not lapse or would otherwise pass to
Morgan’s descendants, such as Chauncy, if Morgan predeceased
him, the probate court correctly dismissed the petition with
prejudice.

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