Surviving relatives and close friends may expect to receive an inheritance after a loved one passes away. However, the deceased’s will sometimes raises more questions than answers when those who expected to be beneficiaries are excluded, or the document contains wishes that appear inconsistent with what beneficiaries anticipated. These circumstances often place the will’s validity into question.
One of the grounds on which a will can be challenged is lack of testamentary capacity, meaning the person who made the will may not have had the legal ability to do so at the time it was created. Understanding what testamentary capacity means, and what the law requires, is an important first step for anyone with reason to question a will’s validity.
What Is Testamentary Capacity?
Testamentary capacity is the legal standard a person must meet to write a valid will. This threshold is quite narrowly defined. As a legal test, rather than a medical one, testamentary capacity has nothing to do with whether someone can manage their finances, make day-to-day decisions, or grant power of attorney. A person might be incapable of handling their own affairs and still have the ability to decide how to distribute their estate.
Testamentary Capacity Requirements
When the will’s validity is called into question in a testamentary capacity dispute, the courts look to whether the will-maker was able to satisfy four criteria at the time the will was signed. The will-maker must have:
- Understood what a will is and what signing one signifies.
- Had a reasonable grasp of what assets, resources, and property they owned and what they were distributing.
- Been able to identify the people who might reasonably expect to benefit from their estate through an inheritance, including having an awareness of moral and legal obligations to family members.
- Been able to weigh all these factors together and arrive at a considered decision concerning how their estate should be divided.
Cognitive Decline and Testamentary Capacity
Just because the deceased had a diagnosed cognitive condition, such as dementia or Alzheimer’s, does not automatically mean they lacked the capacity to make a will. Conditions commonly associated with advanced age or mental deterioration are not grounds for invalidating the deceased’s wishes. What actually matters in will contests is whether the will-maker met the legal requirements when the will was signed.
A complicating factor in these cases is that mental capacity can shift over time. One day, someone might be perfectly lucid, only to be confused or disoriented on another. This is why knowing when the will was written and signed is just as relevant as the will-maker’s overall condition.
That said, there are circumstances that give rise to legitimate concerns about whether someone had the capacity to make a will. These include:
- Trouble communicating
- Memory loss
- Confusion and/or delusions
- Erratic or irrational behaviour
- Changes to a will made later in life
- A new will that looks dramatically different from the original
- A will written in haste
- Medical and mental conditions that affect cognition, such as schizophrenia, Alzheimer’s, or dementia
How to Prove Mental Incapacity
Challenging a will-maker’s mental capacity is not straightforward. When a will has been properly signed and witnessed in accordance with BC’s legal requirements, and the will-maker appears to understand what they were signing, the law assumes the will is valid. This presumption favours whoever is seeking to uphold the will, and it does not disappear simply because someone has doubts about it.
To overcome that presumption, those challenging the will need to bring forward evidence of well-grounded suspicions; a general sense that something was wrong is not enough. Suspicions must be specific and point to something concrete. Well-grounded suspicions may relate to:
- The circumstances surrounding how the will was prepared and executed
- Questions about the will-maker’s state of mind or cognitive ability at the time
- Evidence that the will-maker’s decisions were shaped by coercion or fraud rather than their own free will
One pattern that courts have recognised as potentially suspicious is where a beneficiary played an active role in having the will prepared, especially in cases where that person was in a position of trust or authority over the will-maker. If credible evidence of this kind is put forward, the presumption of validity no longer applies. At that point, the burden shifts to the person seeking to uphold the will to demonstrate that the will-maker understood the extent of their estate, knew who their potential beneficiaries were, and had a genuine grasp of how their assets were being distributed.
Medical records and professional opinions can be relevant to this process, but they are not the deciding factor. Courts also weigh the accounts of people who were present when the will was signed, the recollections of friends and family who spent time with the will-maker around that period, and the evidence of the lawyer who prepared the will and oversaw its execution.
Testamentary Capacity and Undue Influence
Undue influence is a separate but related ground for challenging a will. Even if a will-maker had the mental capacity to make a will, the will can still be invalidated if it can be shown that their decisions were not truly their own.
To succeed, those challenging the will must show that the influence over the will-maker was coercive. Persuasion, family pressure, or persistent requests are not enough on their own. The influence must have been severe enough that the will-maker could not resist it, effectively overriding their ability to act freely and independently. If the will is found not to reflect the will-maker’s genuine intentions, the will may be deemed invalid.
What Happens If a Will is Deemed Invalid
A will that does not meet the legal threshold for testamentary capacity cannot be valid, even if other BC will requirements are met. If the deceased made an earlier will that was valid at the time it was created, that document becomes the governing instrument for how the estate is distributed. If no valid prior will exists, the estate is distributed according to BC’s intestacy rules.
How Stephens & Holman Can Help
If you have concerns about the validity of a will, speaking with an experienced estate litigation lawyer is an important first step. Stephens & Holman has extensive experience representing clients in BC who are navigating difficult questions around testamentary capacity, undue influence, and the distribution of estates. If you believe a will does not reflect the true intentions of the person who made it, contact one of our offices today to schedule a free consultation.