Wills, Trusts & Estates Prof Blog:  Stan Rule (Attorney, British Columbia) posted a blog on the Rule of Law Bolg on August 20 entitled Estate of Watts. The blog discusses a humorous will challenge
involving a woman’s bequest to her husband. The blog is below, in full:

Although I don’t recommend taking shots at family members from the grave in your will, it can make for entertaining reading.

I came across a case from New Brunswick, In re Estate of Watts, 1933 CarswellNB 9 (S.C. App. Div.) in which the will-maker left to her husband the sum of $1 “as memento of the manner in which my husband treated me during our married life.”

Her husband was not overly pleased with the will. After her death he challenged it in court. He argued that she was under an insane delusion that he had been unfaithful to her, and accordingly that she did
not have the mental capacity to make the will. If the Court found that the will-maker was influenced in her decision to essentially disinherit her husband by an insane delusion about him, then she likely was incompetent and the will invalid. There was evidence that she did indeed believe that her husband was
unfaithful.