Undue Influence From A Family Member

The firm acted for a client who felt their father had been unduly influenced to change his Will by another family member. The new Will cut him out of inheriting anything at all from his father’s estate. He did not believe his father wanted to disinherit him, and that he had been unduly influenced to change his Will at a time when he was vulnerable and susceptible to manipulation.

We investigated the circumstances surrounding the father’s supposed change of heart, and we were able to successfully argue our client’s father had been unduly influenced to change his Will. There was evidence in the father’s medical records to suggest he had the early onset of dementia and that the solicitors who had made the new Will for him had been instructed by the other family member and the solicitor had failed to meet with father on his own and to ensure the instructions for the new Will were what father truly wanted to happen to his estate.

This case was settled on favourable terms departing from the terms of the suspicious new Will.

This case demonstrates that it is important to consider all the surrounding circumstances of the making of a new Will and that for a Will be to legally binding, it must reflect the wishes of the person making the Will and those wishes should not be influenced in any way by the wishes of other family members.