Court Opinion

ID: 9556576
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-17 18:03:46.075615+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T08:09:57.757058
License: Public Domain

Filed 8/17/23 Estate of Ellias CA2/6
   NOT TO BE PUBLISHED IN THE OFFICIAL REPORTS
California Rules of Court, rule 8.1115(a), prohibits courts and parties from citing or relying on opinions
not certified for publication or ordered published, except as specified by rule 8.1115(b). This opinion
has not been certified for publication or ordered published for purposes of rule 8.1115.

IN THE COURT OF APPEAL OF THE STATE OF CALIFORNIA

                         SECOND APPELLATE DISTRICT

                                         DIVISION SIX

 Estate of YVONNE ELLIAS,                                     2d Civil No. B322805
 Deceased.                                                  (Super. Ct. No. 56-2021-
                                                            00556111-PR-TR-OXN)
                                                               (Ventura County)

 VERONICA ELLIAS, as
 Trustee, etc.,

      Petitioner and Respondent,

 v.

 DAVID WRIGHT,

      Objector and Appellant.

      David Wright appeals from the probate court’s order
excluding him from receiving certain distributions from a trust
established by his mother, Yvonne Ellias. David1 contends the

         1 We refer to the parties by their first names for clarity.                                  No
disrespect is intended.
court erred when it found that Yvonne did not validly amend the
trust. We affirm.
           FACTUAL AND PROCEDURAL HISTORY
       Yvonne created the Yvonne Ellias Living Trust (Trust) in
2007. She amended the Trust in 2018, naming her stepdaughter,
Veronica Ellias, as trustee. Section 1.04 of the Trust provides:
“Any amendment, restatement, or revocation must be made in
writing and delivered to my then-serving Trustee.” Yvonne
passed away on February 20, 2021. The Trust became
irrevocable upon her death.
      Yvonne purportedly amended the Trust twice more before
she died, in June 2019 and July 2020.2 The amendments
purportedly redistributed Yvonne’s assets, including her home,
from Veronica to David upon Yvonne’s death. Veronica
discovered the amendments after Yvonne died, inside a binder
containing the original estate planning documents.
      Upon that discovery, Veronica petitioned the probate court
to determine the amendments’ validity. She claimed the two
amendments were invalid because they were not delivered to her
as the “then-serving Trustee” during Yvonne’s lifetime. David
objected to Veronica’s petition, maintaining the amendments
were valid because they were delivered to Yvonne, the person
holding the power of revocation, or because they were delivered to
Veronica, albeit not during Yvonne’s lifetime. The court ruled the

      2 The amendment is dated “7-20-20” but Yvonne
purportedly executed it on August 14, 2020. Because the
amendment is referenced by the parties and the trial court with
the July date, we refer to it as the “July 2020 amendment”
throughout this opinion.

                                2
amendments were invalid because they were not delivered to
Veronica during Yvonne’s lifetime.
                           DISCUSSION
       David contends the probate court erred in concluding the
two amendments to the Trust were invalid. He maintains
Yvonne delivered the amendments to Veronica because Veronica
later discovered the amendments inside Yvonne’s estate planning
binder. We disagree.
       “The paramount rule in construing [a trust] instrument is
to determine intent from the instrument itself and in accordance
with applicable law.” (Brown v. Labow (2007) 157 Cal.App.4th
795, 812.) To determine the settlor’s intent, we “look first to the
terms of [the] trust.” (Burch v. George (1994) 7 Cal.4th 246, 256.)
Where, as here, we do not rely on conflicting extrinsic evidence,
the interpretation of a trust agreement is a legal question we
review de novo. (Estate of Powell (2000) 83 Cal.App.4th 1434,
1439.)
      The Probate Code3 governs modification and revocation of a
trust such as Yvonne’s. With respect to trust modification,
“[u]nless the trust instrument provides otherwise, if a trust is
revocable by the settlor, the settlor may modify the trust by the
procedure for revocation.” (§ 15402.) The procedure for
revocation permits a settlor to revoke a trust by “compliance with
any method of revocation provided in the trust instrument”
(§ 15401, subd. (a)(1)) or “[b]y a writing, other than a will, signed
by the settlor or any other person holding the power of revocation
and delivered to the trustee during the lifetime of the settlor or
the person holding the power of revocation” (id., subd. (a)(2)).

      3 Statutory references are to the Probate Code.

                                  3
       Here, section 1.04 requires any modification of the Trust to
be “delivered to [Yvonne’s] then-serving Trustee.” (Italics added.)
Thus, as David concedes, for Yvonne to validly amend the Trust
pursuant to its terms, she was required to deliver the
amendments to Veronica. But Yvonne did not do so when she
purportedly executed the Trust amendments or at any other
point before she passed away. Nor is there evidence that
Veronica had access to Yvonne’s estate planning binder before
her death such that the amendments were “effectively” delivered
to her, as suggested by David. Yvonne therefore could not have
amended the Trust pursuant to its terms. (See Lombardo v.
Huysentruyt (2001) 91 Cal.App.4th 656, 670 [trust modification
ineffective if trust requires delivery of modification to trustee and
settlor fails to inform trustee of modification].)
       Yvonne also could not have amended the Trust pursuant to
section 15402. There is currently a split of authority regarding
whether section 15402 applies when a trust does not state that
its specified modification method is exclusive (compare Balistreri
v. Balistreri (2022) 75 Cal.App.5th 511, review granted May 11,
2022, S273909, with Haggerty v. Thornton (2021) 68 Cal.App.5th
1003, review granted Dec. 22, 2021, S271483), and the matter is
pending before our Supreme Court. We need not weigh in on that
split here because the outcome would remain the same if we were
to apply section 15402: Because she did not amend the Trust
pursuant to its terms, Yvonne could not comply with the
modification method provided in section 15401, subdivision (a)(1).
And because Yvonne did not deliver the amendments to Veronica
during her lifetime, she could not comply with the method
provided in subdivision (a)(2). The probate court thus did not err
in finding the amendments invalid.

                                 4
                         DISPOSITION
      The probate court’s order finding the June 2019 and July
2020 amendments to the Trust invalid, entered June 21, 2022, is
affirmed. Veronica shall recover her costs on appeal.
      NOT TO BE PUBLISHED.

                                   BALTODANO, J.

We concur:

             YEGAN, Acting P. J.

             CODY, J.

                               5
                     Roger L. Lund, Judge

               Superior Court County of Ventura

                ______________________________

      Lowthorp Richards and Christian R. Arrieta for Objector
and Appellant.
      Dushkes Law Corporation and Larry S. Dushkes for
Petitioner and Respondent.