Deathbed Destruction of a Will by Nodding

The recent case of Crew v Oakley [2024] involved someone on her deathbed who cancelled an existing Will (known as revoking) by gesturing to her solicitor to help tear it up.

Carry made a Will in 2020 leaving her wealth to her cousins, as he did not have a good relationship with her closest living relative, her sister, Josephine.  However, Carry later fell out with her cousins and in 2022 became unwell requiring hospital admission.

Carry arranged for her solicitor to visit in hospital so that she could make a new Will, removing her cousins as beneficiaries. The solicitor explained that Carry could immediately revoke her existing Will by simply destroying it, if it no longer represented her wishes.

Carry attempted to tear her Will but was too weak to do it properly.  Seeing her struggle, the solicitor offered assistance.  Carry accepted the offer of help by nodding to her solicitor and together they tore through the Will.  However, before the solicitor could discuss the terms of a new Will Carry became drowsy and was not able to engage further in the meeting.  She passed away soon afterwards without making a new Will.  Without a valid Will in place Carry would be subject to a default set of rules of inheritance (known as the intestacy rules), meaning all of her wealth passed to her surviving sister, Josephine.

When the cousins learnt the Will had been destroyed and they were no longer inheriting they sought to challenge the intestacy rules.  They commissioned a medical expert who stated that Carry was in poor health and suffering from delirious episodes in the period leading up to her death and so did not have sufficient understanding to revoke her Will.  The cousins argued the solicitor was the person who tore up the Will, not Carry, and that a simple nod was not sufficiently clear to convey an intention to revoke a Will.

The court disagreed and ruled that Carry did wish to disinherit her cousins and did so lawfully.  The judge found Carry’s “nod was… a positive communication” of her wish that her solicitor should actively assist her to complete the tearing of the Will.

The judge was ultimately satisfied that Carry intended to destroy her Will and that she understood the consequences of doing so.  The result was her entire estate, worth around £800,000, passed to her sister Josephine.