CASE: Able Australia Services v Yammas [2010] VSC 237

Beryl Rose Simmons (‘the deceased’) died on 19 February 2007. She was 96 years old. About a year earlier, on 23 March 2006, she had signed her last Will.

The last Will made some gifts to her nephew David, three grand-nieces and two charities. It left the residue of her estate (worth about $400,000) to her friend John Yammas.

David was suspicious about the Will. Able Australia Services (formerly the Deafblind Association) had been the primary beneficiary under Beryl's 2004. What had changed to cause Beryl to leave nothing to the charity and most of her estate to her friend?

The last Will was made in suspicious circumstances, including that John Yammas had helped to draft the Will and that the Will was signed at a chemist on the same day Beryl was discharged from hospital and moved into residential aged care.

Did Beryl know what she was doing when she made her last Will?