Contesting a Will Based on Fraud or Mistake

Estate, Trust & Fiduciary Litigation | Langley & Banack | San Antonio, Texas

Not every bad will is the product of a weak mind or heavy pressure. Sometimes a will is signed because of a lie, or because the person was simply mistaken about what it said. Chris Hodge and Jobe Jackson, Shareholders at Langley & Banack, focus their practice on estate, trust, and fiduciary litigation, including will contests. Here they explain fraud and mistake as grounds for setting a will aside.

On this page

• Can a will be set aside because of fraud in Texas?
• What counts as fraud in getting a will signed?
• Can staying silent count as fraud in a will contest?
• What kind of mistake can invalidate a will in Texas?
• Can a will be challenged if the person didn’t know what was in it?

Can a will be set aside because of fraud in Texas?

Yes. Fraud in the inducement is an independent ground for a will contest in Texas. If a lie caused someone to sign a will they would not have signed otherwise, that will can be set aside.

Fraud in the inducement is an independent ground for a will contest. Some courts treat fraud as almost a subset of undue influence, because the evidence can look so similar, but at its core fraud is a false representation that causes someone to act in a way they would not have otherwise acted. In the context of a will, that means a lie used to get someone to sign a will they would not have signed. One case we had recently is a good example: we alleged that the drafting attorney advised the person that if the will was written a certain way it would be valid, when under Texas law it was not going to be valid. We alleged that was fraud on the part of the estate planning attorney, because the person signed the will based on that advice.

What counts as fraud in getting a will signed?

Fraud is a false statement that causes someone to sign or change a will. For example, if someone falsely tells a parent that a child did something terrible so the parent cuts that child out, and the parent relies on that lie, it can be grounds to set the will aside.

The kind of fraud we see is an affirmative false statement that influences the will. Say someone tells the person making the will that so-and-so has done some act or has some problem, and that you should cut them out of the will, but the statement is not true. If that false statement is what influenced the person to change their will, that can be grounds to set the will aside based on fraud.

Can staying silent count as fraud in a will contest?

Yes. The lie behind a fraud claim can also be silence. If someone close to the person knows the person holds a false belief and stays quiet to let it shape the will, that can be fraud in the inducement.

The lie can also just be silence. For instance, say the person making the will has a false belief that a potential beneficiary has serious substance abuse issues, and a worry that leaving them money would just fund more drugs. If the person in proximity to them knew that was not true and failed to speak up, you could allege that silence was fraud in the inducement. It is not only about what someone said, but also about what they knew and did not correct.

What kind of mistake can invalidate a will in Texas?

A will can be challenged for mistake when the person was mistaken about what the will said or what it would do. For example, if they believed the will left property to someone, or left you a certain share, but the document does not say that.

A mistake claim is basically that the person was mistaken about the contents of the will or what it was supposed to do. If the person believed the will gave property somewhere, but that did not occur in the will, that could be a mistake. Or say the person told you, I redid my will today and I left you a third of my estate, but that is not what the will said. In that situation you might have a claim for mistake.

Can a will be challenged if the person didn’t know what was in it?

Yes. Texas presumes that someone who signs a will knows its contents, but that presumption can be challenged. Signs that the person did not know what was in the will, like unsigned initial lines suggesting they never read it, can support a claim.

In Texas, it is presumed that when you sign a document, including a will, you know its contents. But if it is apparent from the face of the will that the person may not have known what was in it, that presumption can be questioned. For example, if there were places on the will for the person to initial and that did not happen, maybe they never read the will before they signed it. That can support a claim that the person did not know the contents of the document, and therefore could not have understood what they were signing.

Related: Contesting a Will Based on Mental Capacity or Dementia