AN UNJUST WILL.

Otaki Mail, 9 November 1923, Page 3

AN UNJUST WILL.

BEQUEATHE MORE MONEY THAN HE FOEEEEaED. “This testator has caused to his ■execuiur ana ins laniiiy u great deai oi -trouble and anxiety really through bequeathing more tnan he possessed,” ueciaied Eir Frederick Chapman when delivering a judgment in the Supreme Court on Saturday in connection wrtn a Foxton -estate. “He treated his sons in a niggardly way despite the fact that he gave two ol them, a medical education and annuities, but he has given so generously to charities connected with his church that hig .estate |dues not contain money enough to make good his gifts.” The case was that Of John Joseph Kane Henncssy and Catherine Henorali Hennessy against the Public Trustee, a motion that came before His Honour in March. “I have come to the conclusion that a reasonable measure by way of rectifying or partially rectifying die injustice done by tlie testator (an injustice which in the l#ase of the eldest son he recognised when he made an attempt to rectify it by an invalid will) and at the same time fay making a provision for their maintenance, which tlie testator ought to have made, is to order the following sums to be allowed out of tire estate: To John Joseph Kane Hennessy, ,) £1200; to William Hennessy, £400; to Janies Hennessy, £800,” continued his Honour. “He ordtted that these *ums slMjJup he paid' ih ffisree equal - instaMWO' the first being paid as found convenient, and the others, A feasible, at intervals of six months-” His Honour went on to say: “The testator endeavoured to make good the defect in the provision for his' eldest son,, J, J- Hennessy. This he did by purporting to give him £ISOO means of an inoperative instrument, I cannot accept this as decisive of the amount that I ought, to allow as it was probably, like “the will itself, mafia under the belief that, ™ estate would yield a H th®! ‘ho ? ni ‘ Posed on it, in which he was mistaken. W, howlever, represents ms idea of what is just. , Even with these (.allowances, he considered that the will remained an unjust one, and said it was beyond his power to rectify injustice beyond tdiat the court was, following the terms of the statute, authorised to do.