BURST
A woman cut out of her father’s will because they were estranged has been awarded almost half of his estate by the B.C. Supreme Court.
The 2022 will of Daniel Dancey “did not make adequate, just and equitable provision for the proper maintenance and support” of Kristin Enes, according to Justice Judith Hoffman.
“His reasons for disinheriting her are not defensible,” she ruled.
Dancey’s son, Jeffery Dancey, opposed changing the will, which left almost all of the $1.8 million estate to him, maintaining his father had reason to leave nothing to his sister.
He also told the court that his father wanted him to inherit the estate because he lived in the basement of the house and helped him around the house.
Hoffman found that Jeffery Dancey was entitled to 55 per cent of the estate and Enes 45 per cent.
“Jeffery’s moral claim to the estate, in comparison to Kristin’s claim, is slightly enhanced due to the care he provided to Dan in the last years of his life,” she said in the decision.
The ruling outlined factors used to assess whether the deceased parent has a moral obligation to independent children. According to precedents, these include the relationship between parent and child, including “abandonment, neglect and estrangement by one or the other” and the reason for disinheriting a child, she said.
Others include the size of the estate, what each child contributed to the estate, the claimant’s reasonable expectations, standard of living, financial need, character and the needs of other beneficiaries.
“Misconduct can justify a disinheritance, but only when it is directed at the will maker and is relatively severe,” Hoffman wrote, citing a 2010 B.C. decision.
Court heard there were two periods of estrangement, which came after Enes allowed her mother to live with her after she separated from Dancey and, more recently, after Enes separated from her husband.
It heard Dancey was estranged from others in his life and that he had evicted his son from his basement suite at one point.
Enes testified that she had reconciled with her father in 2023, a year after the will was written, a view disputed by her brother.
Hoffman said she found Enes the more credible and reliable witness.
“Even if they had not reconciled, the weight of the evidence supports the conclusion that the estrangement was not caused by Kristin and, therefore, cannot constitute just cause to disinherit her.”
“The evidence demonstrates that the estrangement originated with Dan and his disappointment in Kristin’s divorce … not a valid and rational reason to disinherit her,” she ruled.
Hoffman said Enes is a single mother of three with a mortgage and her financial circumstances are “precarious” and “this factor weighs in favour of a variation.”
She acknowledged Jeffery Dancey made more contributions to the estate than Enes, but “not so overwhelming as to negate Dan’s moral obligation to provide for Kristin.”
The brother maintained his financial circumstances were worse than his sister’s because he does not own property and that he will have to move out of his father’s house if the estate were split.
He said he didn’t work because he chose instead to look after his father, who was suffering seizures in the years before he died.
But Hoffman found it was his choice to forgo more reliable forms of income and that his financial need “does not translate into a higher moral claim to the estate than Kristin.”