HEARING CONTINUED

Southland Times, Issue 21273, 19 December 1930, Page 6

HEARING CONTINUED

HUNTER WILL CASE. MR WATSON’S OPENING. (Per United Press Association.) Wellington, December IS. , The Hunter will case was continued in the Supreme Court to-day. Daniel George Arthur Cooper, formerly Registrar of the Supreme Court, and afterwards a Stipendiary Magistrate, said that he saw Sir George Hunter last August, when he spoke quite clearly and his face seemed the same as witness had alwliys known it. •Alexander Dunn, barrister and solicitor, who was recalled, produced a file af letters from Bethune and Hunter’s letter box forwarded to Mr Percy Hunter in connection with Sir George’s affairs between October 8, 1929, and June 17, 1930. The letters were based on conversations he had had with Sir George. Witness eaid that Sir George’s power of doing business was the same after the strokes as before. His whole manner was the same and he required no prompting.

Mr Justice Reed said that he regarded the letters as very important. Replying to his Honour, witness said that Sir George appreciated that the Government’s super-tax would affect him considerably. In fact Sir George’s case had been quoted in Parliament. . Dr. Twhigg said that, providing Sir George’s affairs were not too intricate, and providing that he had some assistance, it was possible he, could have made a will within two weeks of his stroke. There'were no definite tests-for testamentary capacity laid down as far as witness knew. One judged cases on general lines and it was usual to satisfy oneself as to a patient’s soundness of mind. Where there was extensive paralysis due to apoplexy, there was usually a general mental impairment, but not always. It was quite possible to have a paralysis case that had nothing to do with the brain. There had been nothing in the history of Sir George's case that gave him the impression that the stroke had been severe. This concluded the plaintiff’s case. Case for the Defence. Mr Watson, in his opening address, said that Lady Hunter had only decided to lodge the caveat that had caused the present action after full inquiries had been made from the people who were thought to be competent to say Sir George had had no testamentary capacity, namely, Drs. Steele and Giesen, the attending doctor and the consulting doctor respectively; The evidence would show that at a long interview, with them at the time, both Dr Steele and Dr Giesen were emphatic that Sir George, at no time before his departure to Rotorua, had had any testamentary capacity. Included in Dr Giesen’s evidence would be certain evidence dealing with Dr Steele’s previous actions and utterances as to Sir George’s testamentary capacity. • Lady |

Hunter, as the result of the evidence gained at this conference, had decided to contest the granting of probate. Lady Hunter’s attitude in contesting the wills did not arise from any complaint of her treatment. She had taken action for the interest and benefit of her child, Betty. His Honour: But the child takes nothing under the 1924 will. Mr Watson: Ultimately she will take everything. She has a, reversionary inter, est. His Honour: She gets nothing in the meantime. Lady Hunter is _ a young woman, and the girl takes no interest till her death or her re marriage. It is a very different position under the last will. Mr Watson said that Lady Hunter was trying to ensure that the wishes of Sir George, made before his illness, would be given effect to. She had had nothing to I do with the October will, counsel said, and had entirely .disapproved of the will-mak-ing at that time. His Honour: Can you point out any unfairness in .the October will? Mr Watson: In its unexplained and sudden cutting down of the child’s interests. Mr Watson proceeded to , compare the provisions made for the child in the three wills and went on to say that it was suggested that the estate was not worth the value it was said to be until all the annuities had come back into the estate on the deaths of the people to whom they were paid, thus making the annuity fund available for the estate. If it was a fact that there would be no income from the estate until the annuities and other charges had fallen back into the residue, then counsel contended the child was not a whit the better off under the 1929 will than under the 1924 will, on which Lady Hunter asked for the Court’s pronouncement.