Lewis v Watson[2025] QSC 35

SUPREME COURT OF QUEENSLAND

1. [1]
   By an originating application the applicant sought a revocation of the letters of administration with the will which had been issued by the Supreme Court in Townsville on 29 August 2024. The grant was issued to the respondent, as attorney for her father, who is the named executor of the deceased’s last will.
2. [2]
   The basis for the revocation of the grant was a contention by the applicant that in fact there was another handwritten document of the deceased’s which, pursuant to s 18 of the Succession Act 1981 (Qld), ought to be declared to constitute the deceased’s valid informal will. The applicant claims to be a beneficiary of that informal will.
3. [3]
   By a subsequent application filed on 30 January 2025, the applicant sought a range of other forms of relief in relation to disclosure and freezing orders.  When the matter came on for hearing before me the parties agreed that:

   1. if the applicant proved that the informal will satisfied the requirements of the Succession Act, then the alternative relief would not be required as the applicant would (subject to the formal requirements of the Registrar) be entitled to a revocation of the letters of administration on the basis that the grant was made because of a mistake (Uniform Civil Procedure Rules 1999, r 642) such that the alternative orders would not be required; and
   2. if the applicant failed in obtaining orders in relation to the informal will, he would have no standing to pursue any of the alternative relief.
4. [4]
   It followed that the only matter for my consideration at the hearing was whether the applicant was able to establish that the handwritten document satisfied the requirements of s 18 of the Succession Act as an informal will.

Background

5. [5]
   Stewart Robb Gray was a 62-year-old, unmarried man, when he died on 16 May 2024.  He had no children. 
6. [6]
   He was survived by his father, Leslie Robb Gray who is 94 years of age, and his only sibling, the respondent Robyn Lyn Watson.  The deceased’s mother and father had divorced many years before.
7. [7]
   In September 1989, when the deceased was approximately 27 years of age, he made a will in the form of a typewritten document which provided as follows:

“WILL.

This is the last will and testament of me, Stewart Robb GRAY, single, of Flat 2, 41 Kidston Terrace, Chermside, Brisbane, in the State of Queensland.

1.  I revoke all former wills and codicils and declare this to be my last will.

2.  I appoint my father, Leslie Robb GRAY, of 17 Hinkler Street, Kedron, Brisbane, to be the executor of this my will.

3.  To my father, the aforesaid Leslie Robb GRAY, I bequeath the following:-

1.  Property (including house) and such contents of the afore-said house that are not the property of the tenant who, from time to time, may be renting the premises situated at 51 Viscount Street, Bray Park, Brisbane, in the State of Queensland described as Lot 241 on Registered Plan 141721, County of Stanley, Parish of Warner; and

2.  Property (including shed) and such contents of the aforesaid shed situated at Ellwood Drive, Caboolture, in the State of Queensland described as Lot 10 on Registered Plan 153 495, County of Canning, Parish of Wararba; and

3.  Any monies and other assets of which I am the owner; and

4.  Any remainder which may be due to my estate.

Signed this twenty second day of September, 1989 at Brisbane in the State of Queensland.

(signature affixed)

Signed the said Stewart Robb GRAY as and for his last will and testament in the presence of us, both being present at the same time at his request.  In his presence, and in the presence of each other, we have hereunto subscribed our names as witnesses

(signatures of witnesses affixed)”

8. [8]
   The will is dated 22 September 1989 and is signed by the deceased. 
9. [9]
   On the part of the document for witnesses’ signatures, the will was witnessed by two persons, both of whom identified themselves by reference to their addresses and occupations.  Each of them separately dated the document to bear the same date as the deceased’s own signature, 22 September 1989.
10. [10]
    That is the will for which a grant has issued.
11. [11]
    The will gifted the entirety of the deceased’s estate to his father, Leslie Gray.
12. [12]
    During his lifetime, the deceased suffered from significant ill health.  He was an insulin dependent diabetic and suffered from cardiomyopathy, atrial fibrillation and obstructive sleep apnoea.  He was morbidly obese which severely affected his ability to be active.  Because of his poor health, he had a couple of major health scares prior to his death; a stroke in around 2016 or 2017, and in 2020 or 2021 his big toe required amputation due to a cut which did not heal properly as a result of his diabetes.  At the time he became septic and was seriously unwell. 
13. [13]
    After he recovered from this incident in about 2020 or 2021, he took his will to his father and asked him to keep it for him.  His father kept the will in an envelope along with the title deeds to the father’s family home.  According to the respondent, it was common knowledge in the family that the deceased was leaving his entire estate to his dad as he and his dad were very close, and the deceased had no partner or children.
14. [14]
    After the deceased died, his father, because of age but not infirmity, did not wish to accept the grant. The deceased’s sister sought, and obtained, a grant of his last will. 
15. [15]
    The applicant is not related to the deceased by birth or marriage. 
16. [16]
    The applicant’s mother, Sharon Mitchell (also known as Sharon Lewis) and the deceased were close friends throughout the deceased’s lifetime.  The applicant deposes that his mother met the deceased when they both commenced employment with the same employer when she was 16 years of age.  They both worked there until about January 2013 when Sharon and the deceased were made redundant.  At the time of the deceased’s death, Sharon and the deceased had been friends for some 42 years.
17. [17]
    On 7 January 2025, the applicant discovered a handwritten document authored by the deceased dated 10 July 1991, postdating the will by approximately two years. The applicant contends that the document of 10 July 1991 is an informal will for the purposes of s 18 of the Succession Act, and therefore seeks a revocation of the grant of the September 1989 will, and an order that the document of 10 July 1991 be found to be the deceased’s last will.

The alleged informal will

18. [18]
    The alleged informal will is a seven page handwritten document, which the evidence suggests was sent to Sharon by mail some time after the date it bears of 10 July 1991.  The original document, in the envelope addressed to Sharon Mitchell, and stamped at the Stafford Mail Centre (on a date which is unable to be deciphered), was tendered before me.
19. [19]
    The respondent accepts that it was likely the document had been written by the deceased and posted to Sharon at her then address at Mango Hill.  A full copy of the document is set out at Annexure A to this judgment. 
20. [20]
    The applicant objected to the description of the document as a “letter”, suggesting in fact it was a legal document for the reasons which I will detail below.  To be neutral, I will refer to it as a “document”, but I observe that it has the hallmarks of a letter because:

    1. it was sent by mail, in an envelope with a stamp, and posted to Sharon;
    2. it commences with the greeting “Hello Princess” and ends with “I love you.  Stewart”; and
    3. the document deals with a range of different issues, including setting out at some length the deceased’s affection for Sharon.
21. [21]
    Primarily, the applicant relied upon the following parts of the document as those which the court would construe as an informal will:

“My sole ambition in life now is to love you forever and to accumulate as much wealth as I can to one day give to you and your son.  If I were to die tomorrow then you and your little boy would inherit almost a half a million dollars.  I didn’t ever want to tell you this because I know how angry you’ll be with me.  But I want you to have it Sharon, I have to leave it to somebody and I know I will never have children of my own.  So please just accept it.  I’m not looking for a medal or anything; I would be happy enough for eternity if you would simply have fond memories of me and the short time we had together.  Just a poor silly fool who loved you above all else the world had to offer.”

22. [22]
    Elsewhere the applicant relied on the following:

“I know I will never have a son and I often wonder what your little boy is like.  I guess you wonder why I have never come to see him even though I have been invited.  The truth is that whilst I was pretending I was fine I was scared I would burst into tears when I saw him and make an idiot of myself in front of you.  You are the only woman I ever wanted to have a son with so maybe your little boy looks one half of what our son would have looked like.”

23. [23]
    I set out other parts of the document upon which the applicant relies in more details below.

Section 18 Succession Act

24. [24]
    Where a document does not comply with the full execution requirements of the Succession Act, the court may nevertheless admit a document to probate if it is satisfied that the document embodies the testamentary intentions of a deceased person.
25. [25]
    The execution requirements with which the document does not comply are those requirements set out at s 10 of the Succession Act.  That section requires that a will must be in writing, signed by the testator (or someone else in the presence of and at the direction of the testator), and the signature must be made or acknowledged by the testator in the presence of two or more witnesses present at the same time.  No party submitted that the document complied with the requirements of s 10, and plainly it did not.
26. [26]
    One then turns to the terms of s 18 which provides:

“18 Court may dispense with execution requirements for will, alteration or revocation

1.  This section applies to a document, or a part of a document, that─

1.  purports to state the testamentary intentions of a deceased person; and

2.  has not been executed under this part.

2.  The document or the part forms a will, an alteration of a will, or a full or partial revocation of a will, of the deceased person if the court is satisfied that the person intended the document or part to form the person’s will, an alteration to the person’s will or a full or partial revocation of the person’s will.

3.  In making a decision under subsection (2), the court may, in addition to the document or part, have regard to─

1.  any evidence relating to the way in which the document or part was executed; and

2.  any evidence of the person’s testamentary intentions, including evidence of statements made by the person.

4.  Subsection (3) does not limit the matters a court may have regard to in making a decision under subsection (2).

5.  This section applies to a document, or a part of a document, whether the document came into existence within or outside the State.”

27. [27]
    The three requirements which must be satisfied in order for the court to admit a document to probate are:

    1. first, whether there was a document;
    2. second, if yes, did the document purport to embody the testamentary intentions of the deceased? and
    3. third, did the deceased intend that the document would operate as his last will?^[1]
28. [28]
    In respect of the last criteria, Burns J in Sheehan’s case observed:^[2]

“[17] … there will need to be satisfactory evidence to demonstrate (either at the time the document is brought into existence or at some later time) that the deceased, by some act or words, manifested the intention that the document should, without more on his or her part operate as his or her will.  In examining the evidence in this regard, the court must keep in mind that the evidence is to be evaluated in accordance with Brigginshaw principles.  As Boddice J (with whom Gotterson JA agreed said in Lindsay v McGrath:

 “Great care is to be taken in the evaluation of the relevant evidence.  To satisfy the onus, the evidence must show more than that the particular document sets out the deceased’s testamentary intentions or that it is consistent with other statements the deceased made about what he or she wanted to happen to the property upon death.  The evidence must establish on the balance of probabilities that the deceased wanted the particular document to be his or her final Will, and didn’t want to make any changes to that document.

…

Documents which contain only preliminary, tentative or incomplete expressions of a deceased’s testamentary intentions, or which on the evidence are demonstrated to have been prepared for consideration, further thought, deliberation or possible revision, will not suffice for the purposes of s 18 as the evidence will not establish the document in question embodied the settled testamentary intentions of the deceased.”

(footnotes omitted)

29. [29]
    There is no particular form required to satisfy the elements of s 18.  This court has construed a variety of documents as ones which satisfy the requirements of s 18 including handwritten notes drafted shortly prior to death,^[3] unsent text messages,^[4] video recordings on mobiles phones,^[5] audio recorded voice memos,^[6] documents created on an iPhone,^[7] and a DVD.^[8] Equally however, the court has rejected other such documents such as unsigned documents saved on a computer.^[9]
30. [30]
    What can be gleaned from the array of cases to which I have referred above is that the court will carefully scrutinize the document in question for the purpose of drawing a conclusion as to whether or not it satisfies the requirements of s 18.  Further, while the remedial nature of the legislation has meant that a liberal approach has been taken to the construction of s 18,^[10] the court must still be satisfied to the requisite standard as demonstrated in Lindsay’s case.

Application of principle

31. [31]
    There is satisfaction of the first element of s 18 that there is a “document”.  The term document is defined in s 5 of the Succession Act, for the purposes of s 18 to mean a document as is contained in the Acts Interpretation Act 1954, Schedule 1.  The term document is defined expansively to include:

“document─

a. means a record of information, however recorded; and

b. includes─

1. a thing on which there is writing; and

2. a thing on which there are marks, symbols or perforations having a meaning for persons qualified to interpret them; and

3. an electronic document.

32. [32]
    In the circumstances, the handwritten document of 10 July 1991 is a document.
33. [33]
    It is the second and third elements of s 18 which require greater consideration.
34. [34]
    In The Estate of Masters (deceased) Hill v Plummer,^[11] the court discussed the meaning of the second element, that the document must purport to state the deceased’s testamentary intentions, in the following terms:

“There are in the present context, several things which are relevant in that regard.  First, the document must state the deceased’s ‘testamentary intentions’, that is, his wishes or intentions as to how, voluntarily, his property is to pass or be disposed of after his death.  A will may, of course, do other things:  it may, for example, appoint a legal personal representative, exercise a special power, appoint a guardian or the like … but it is the disposition of the deceased’s property voluntarily after his death which is, for the present purposes, the relevant characteristic of a will.”^[12] 

(footnotes omitted)

35. [35]
    Dealing first with the words which the applicant relies upon:

“My sole ambition in life now is to love you forever and to accumulate as much wealth as I can to one day give to you and your son.  If I were to die tomorrow then you and your little boy would inherit almost a half a million dollars.  I didn’t ever want to tell you this because I know how angry you’ll be with me.  But I want you to have it Sharon, I have to leave it to somebody and I know I will never have children of my own.  So please just accept it.  I’m not looking for a medal or anything; I would be happy enough for eternity if you would simply have fond memories of me and the short time we had together.  Just a poor silly fool who loved you above all else the world had to offer.”

36. [36]
    In the original document, these words commence towards the bottom of the second page. The first page of the letter is substantially taken up with the deceased defending himself against an allegation that he had set fire to Sharon’s home (an allegation which he denied) and attempting to explain himself in relation to a separate occasion in which he had invaded Sharon’s privacy and frightened her (an allegation which he accepted). The first page and three-quarters are devoted to the deceased’s protestations about how his love for Sharon was such that he never could have harmed her, including statements such as:

    1. “… I still love you as much as I ever did – it still feels like we stopped seeing each other just yesterday – and I miss you every day of my life.”;
    2. “… in all of my saddest times Sharon I have never had an evil thought towards you …”;
    3. “I’m still the same old Stewart who loved you so much and I haven’t flipped out …”
    4. “I don’t want you to live in fear of me …”;
    5. “If I were to hurt you now I would be saying that the last 10 years of my life have been for nothing ...”
37. [37]
    It is in the context of those preceding one and three-quarter pages that the applicant submits that I should pay particular regard to the deceased’s expressed intentions that his sole ambition in life (other than to love Sharon forever) was:

“… to accumulate as much wealth as I can to one day give to you and your son.”

38. [38]
    I do not accept that those words are sufficient to demonstrate a dispositive intention. 
39. [39]
    The language is crafted as an “ambition” to “one day” make such a gift to Sharon and her son. At best, the words might suggest a future intention to “one day” make a will in Sharon’s favour, but the words do not record the present dispositive intention that the document be that gift.
40. [40]
    Second, as to the words:

“If I were to die tomorrow then you and your little boy would inherit almost a half a million dollars.”

41. [41]
    I accept the applicant’s submission that the sentence, but particularly the words “would inherit” might be capable of suggesting that the deceased had already made a will in favour of Sharon and her son, but there is no evidence that that in fact had occurred; and that is not the applicant’s case in any event.  In fact, the evidence is to the contrary that only two years before this document was written, the deceased had in fact made a will in favour of his father. 
42. [42]
    If the deceased had in fact already made a will in favour of Sharon before the date of the document of 10 July 1991, then it seems likely the deceased would have used language to that effect to direct Sharon to the fact that such a will had been made.  For example, he might have given a copy to her, or told her where it could be found. But the language is not crafted as if the deceased has already taken this step. 
43. [43]
    Furthermore, when the document was posted to Sharon, the deceased enclosed with it photocopies of his diary at the time that the fire had taken place at Sharon’s house so that Sharon could see that the deceased was “feeling fine at the time” of the fire.  The deceased described that he had shown the diary to the police as well.  The applicant relied upon this as evidence that the deceased could not have set fire to the applicant’s house because he was at home writing in the diary at the time.  Whether it proves that fact is not relevant in this proceeding, but what is relevant is that if the deceased had in fact made a will in favour of Sharon, he could easily have included photocopies of it with the correspondence to her, as he did with the copies of his diary, but he did not. 
44. [44]
    Alternatively, although less likely, that wording might suggest that the deceased was intending to make a will, and to make a gift in favour of Sharon, or perhaps Sharon and the applicant.  But the words themselves do not contain dispositive language to suggest that the document itself was that which was making the gift.
45. [45]
    The next, and third, words that the applicant relies upon is:

“But I want you to have it Sharon, I have to leave it to some body, and I know I will never have children of my own. So please just accept it.”

46. [46]
    I accept that phrase demonstrates an expression of the deceased’s wishes, but it seems to me it is more consistent with him imploring Sharon to accept a gift which he wishes to make, but which the document itself is not effective to make, even read together with the earlier words I have already dealt with.
47. [47]
    Next, if the document were purporting to embody the testamentary intentions of the deceased, then the deceased is likely to have used words as he did in the will of 1989. The words are likely to have been clearly dispositive as they were in that document which:

    1. revoked former wills;
    2. appointed an executor; and
    3. made gifts of property and residue.
48. [48]
    This document did none of those things.
49. [49]
    Furthermore, the words I have already set out cannot be seen in isolation from the balance of the document.  The document has the hallmarks of a letter from a love-struck man to a woman who was in a relationship with someone else.^[13]  The relied upon words are part of a much broader piece of correspondence professing the deceased’s love for Sharon and seeking to describe that love in a variety of different ways including:

    1. wistful reminiscences of occasions that they had spent alone together;
    2. recollections of occasions that he had spent with her in the company of others;
    3. descriptions of his grief at being unable to share a relationship with her; and
    4. a denial that he had started a fire at her family home.
50. [50]
    It would be wrong to place undue emphasis on a few words, taken out of the broader context, to attribute testamentary intentions to those words. 
51. [51]
    These are not, however, the only parts of the seven page document that the applicant relies upon, but it seems to me they are the strongest. I deal with the others nevertheless.
52. [52]
    Fourth, the applicant relies upon the words:

“I’ve got my cross to bear and I feel the weight of it every day but I have come to accept it.  I know I will never have a son and I often wonder what your little boy is like.  I guess you wonder why I have never come to see him even though I have been invited.  The truth is that whilst I was pretending I was fine I was scared I would burst into tears when I saw him and make an idiot of myself in front of you.  You are the only woman I ever wanted to have a son with so maybe your little boy looks one half of what our son would have looked like.”

53. [53]
    This, the applicant submits, was a reflection of the fact that the deceased saw the applicant as like a son to him even though, at the time the words were written, the applicant accepts that the deceased had never met the applicant, who at that time was a small child.  Whilst the weight of the deceased’s affection for Sharon is reflected in the words, there is nothing in the words to demonstrate the deceased’s testamentary intentions.
54. [54]
    Fifth, the applicant submits that the words:

“How can I put years of thoughts into just one letter.  I have written you many over the years but have not posted one because I do not want to become a burden to you.”

55. [55]
    The applicant makes a number of submissions about these sentences, one of which includes that because the evidence suggested the deceased was a hoarder, the letters which are referred to above ought to have been discovered after the deceased’s death and they have not.  He suggests some mala fides on the part of the respondent in relation to that issue, but the respondent was not cross-examined in relation to it.  When pressed, I did not understand the applicant to in fact suggest that those sentences could in fact purport to embody any of the deceased’s testamentary intentions. 
56. [56]
    Sixth, the applicant relied upon the words:

“Rob Peacey at work saw you and Kevin and Kielan (spelt right?) at Caboolture once and quite innocently said to me one day that your son looked a bit like me.  I had to make an excuse and bolt to the toilet in tears for a while.” (brackets in original)

57. [57]
    The applicant suggested that this notation by the deceased suggested that in fact the deceased might have thought that the applicant was actually his son.  The deceased’s name does not appear on the applicant’s birth certificate, his father’s name does.  Again, although the applicant relies upon this part as being testamentary, he was unable to articulate how these sentences purported to embody the deceased’s testamentary intentions.
58. [58]
    Seventh, the applicant relied upon:

“Not long after we stopped seeing each other I had to stop driving my Charger.  That car has special memories of you and I and I know how much you loved it and trusted my driving even when I was flying.  It just sits under Mum’s house.  I haven’t even started it for years.  Maybe “one day” you’ll let me take you for a drive again and our fond memories will come back to us.  Its just a nice dream I have.” (underlining and errors in original)

59. [59]
    In relation to these words the applicant submitted that because the deceased made particular reference to his motor vehicle, a Charger, I should construe that phrase as an intention to gift the Charger motor vehicle to Sharon.  The submission, respectfully, strains even the broadest construction that could be put on the words.  There is simply nothing dispositive in the reminisces about the deceased and Sharon travelling in the Charger.  Again, the deceased used the expression “one day”, this time both in quotes and underlined, but the context is somewhat similar to where he used the same phrase elsewhere, crafted as a hope or aspiration, not as a gift.
60. [60]
    Finally, the applicant relied upon the words “I’m sorry princess, for all the pain I’ve caused you” as being read to be “This is the will. I’m sorry for all the pain I’ve caused you from leaving (you) everything.” No sensible reading of the words written can be construed in that way. The words “This is the will” do not appear in the document, and the context does not suggest that should be inferred.
61. [61]
    Above I have examined each of these phrases separately, but I now turn to consider whether the sentences, words or phrases, taken together, could be construed as purporting to embody the deceased’s testamentary intentions.
62. [62]
    Rather than assisting the applicant’s case, when taken together, the words only serve to demonstrate that the document is a love letter, not a document which records the deceased’s testamentary intentions. The document does not resemble a will, in form or substance, as the one of 1989 does. It does not use similar language to the will; it uses the language of a love letter. In contrast, when the deceased had in fact prepared a will in September 1989, just less than two years before the date of this document,  that document was:

    1. typewritten;
    2. described as a “will”;
    3. used the phrase “this is the last will and testament of me, Stewart Robb Gray…”;
    4. expressly revoked all former wills and codicils;
    5. declared the document to be his last will;
    6. appointed an executor, his father;
    7. used the terminology that he bequeathed property, which he then identified, to his father;
    8. separately identified monies and other assets from property which he owned;
    9. contained a dispositive clause as to the “remainder” of his estate;
    10. was dated and signed by him; and
    11. was witnessed in the presence of two witnesses.
63. [63]
    Had the deceased intended to make a will in favour of Sharon, and/or her son, he well knew and understood what the requirements were because he had made such a document himself previously. The document the applicant seeks to prove is an entirely different one.
64. [64]
    As to the applicant’s contention that the document was not a letter but was a “legal document”, the applicant relied upon two main factors. The first was the deceased’s signature at the conclusion of the document which he contended meant that the document was “signed”, rather than that the deceased had merely affixed his name, which converted the document to a legal document.
65. [65]
    I reject this submission because, first, on a factual basis, the signature appears to read “Stewart”, the very name which the applicant contends would mean it was a letter not a signature. Second, I find it is the same name on at least one of the birthday cards also sent to Sharon,^[14] which was plainly not a “legal document”. Even if I am wrong about the signature, there is no basis to think a signature rather than a name “converts it from just a standard letter between friends into a legal document…” as the applicant submits.
66. [66]
    The second factor to support that this was a legal document was submitted by the applicant to be that the deceased put a “time stamp” on the document when he wrote “PS. It’s 2.35am. I’m going to bed.” Those words do nothing to convert the letter into a legal document; rather they are entirely consistent with the balance of the document, being a love letter.
67. [67]
    There is no satisfaction of the second criteria listed in [27] above.
68. [68]
    As to the third criteria, that the applicant must demonstrate that there is evidence to suggest that the deceased, by his words or actions, intended that the document of 10 July 1991 should operate, without anything further being done, as a will, I am satisfied that there is no evidence in relation to this element.
69. [69]
    The deceased’s sister gave evidence that the deceased had made it “common knowledge” that he was leaving the entire estate to his father as he and his father were very close.  Her evidence does not establish as to what the deceased said or did in order to make it such “common knowledge”, but nor was the respondent challenged in relation to that evidence. 
70. [70]
    However, the respondent submitted evidence that after the amputation of the deceased’s toe in 2020 or 2021, when he was critically ill, the deceased took his 1989 will to his father and asked him to keep it. This fact is inconsistent with the applicant demonstrating, by act or words, that the document the applicant seeks to propound was intended by the deceased to be his last will.  In fact, the contrary is true.  The deceased’s actions in providing the 1989 will to his father in around 2020 or 2021 in fact strongly supports the conclusion that the deceased intended that document to be his last will, and not the 1991 document.
71. [71]
    The applicant’s last submission in relation to this third element was difficult to follow. The applicant submitted that the court could find that the deceased intended this document to be his will when he wrote it in 1991 because:

    1. he wrote it and then posted it, predicting that someone would find it after his death and recognise it as his will;
    2. he did not get anyone else to witness it (even though he knew wills had to be witnessed) because it would have been an odd thing for him to send a witnessed document to Sharon, and he did not wish to alert her to the fact that the document was a will; and
    3. it would be unlikely that the deceased wanted his elderly father to be his beneficiary because he was so old at age 94, ignoring that the deceased’s father was not 94 in 1989 or 1991.
72. [72]
    The applicant submits that these factors, taken with the fact that the deceased maintained his friendship with Sharon up until he died, could together lead to the conclusion that the deceased intended this document to be his will, but “…because of the situation that he was in, he couldn’t reveal to (Sharon) that it was, (so) he’s structured it in a way that is not obvious to the average person.”
73. [73]
    This submission must be rejected. It suggests that the deceased knew and understood the requirements of s 18 of the Succession Act, at a time the section did not exist.^[15] Even were that not so, the submission strains credibility.
74. [74]
    There is no satisfaction of the third criteria.  Accordingly, the application is dismissed.
75. [75]
    For the reasons set out at [3] above, it is not necessary to decide any further issue.  The applicant is ordered to pay the respondent’s costs of the application on the standard basis.

ANNEXURE A

10-7-91