The law of wills has some interesting components. Two of those involve the concepts of lapse and anti-lapse – complementary concepts that address the disposition of property that is willed to someone who dies before the testator. Under the common law, if a beneficiary under a will died before the testator and was to get part or all of the testator’s residuary estate, then that property would pass by intestate succession – just as if the testator had left no will. That’s known as the “no residue of a residue” rule – the portion of the residuary estate that did not pass itself under the will could not be considered part of the residuary estate. But, by statute, many states have changed the common law rule by enacting “anti-lapse” statutes. Those statutes “save” the bequest if it has been made to parties specified in the statute, usually members of the decedent’s immediate family, if those family members had descendants. In that case, the descendants of the deceased beneficiary inherit whatever was willed to that beneficiary. Of course, the testator can prevent operation of the anti-lapse statute by providing that the gift will only go to the named beneficiary if that beneficiary survives the testator, or by simply stating in the will that the anti-lapse statute does not apply. These concepts were involved in this case.
Here, the decedent executed a will in 2002 and died in 2006. His wife predeceased him as did two of his five children. Both of the predeceased children died before the decedent executed his will. That turned out to be a key point in the case. That’s because the decedent’s will left his entire estate equally to his five children except “in the event any of my children should predecease me leaving issue who survive me, then the share of such predeceased child shall go in equal shares to his or her issue who survive me, per stirpes.” His three surviving children claimed that the will language meant to include only them – the decedent’s children that survived him, and not the grandchildren of one of their deceased siblings. That predeceased sibling only had one child, and that child also predeceased the decedent, but left two surviving children – great-grandchildren of the decedent. The other pre-deceased child of the decedent died without leaving issue – so there was no issue there.
Iowa has an anti-lapse statute – it says that surviving issue of a pre-deceased child inherit their ancestor’s share, unless the decedent’s will is clear and explicit to the contrary. The decedent’s will looked to be clear – he wanted the issue of a predeceased child to inherit their ancestor’s share. But, the Iowa anti-lapse statute defines “devisee” as a person who dies after execution of the decedent’s will” unless the will specifies otherwise. Here the pre-deceased child that left surviving issue died long before the decedent executed his will. So, the anti-lapse statute didn’t apply, and the great-grandchildren were not beneficiaries of great-granddad’s estate. When the decedent said “in the event any of my children should predecease me” he knew that two of his children had already died, so that language, the court believed, could only possibly refer to the possibility of any or all of the three remaining children dying before he died – and the decedent’s will didn’t clearly state that issue of an already pre-deceased child should be included. Estate of Guthrie v. Busch, No. 8-093/07-1427 (Iowa Ct. App. May 14, 2008).