Slayer Statute in Montana
An excerpt from the introduction is below:
The importance of In re Estates of Swansons is not merely confined to the issue of whether a killer with an adjudicated mental illness maintains inheritance rights to a decedent’s estate. Rather, this case is notable for how the Court, when faced with a statute that seemed to put this case to a close, arrived at just the opposite conclusion. Given Jeanette’s guilty plea to deliberate homicide–a statutory felony with the requisite mental state of “purposely” and “knowingly”–the Slayer Statute’s requirements of a felonious and intentional killing might seem satisfied at first glance. The Court found the opposite to be true, however, finding several ways in which the Slayer Statute’s requirements had not necessarily been met. Moreover, it found her guilty plea in criminal court did not carry over into the subsequent civil proceeding to preclude her from litigating whether she acted feloniously and intentionally.
The purpose of this note is to examine how the Court was able to find that Jeanette’s guilty plea to deliberate homicide did not automatically bar her inheritance rights under the Slayer Statute. First, the note discusses the Slayer Statute and highlights its relevant portions in In re Estates of Swansons. Second, the note presents an overview of collateral estoppel and its applicability to nolo contendere pleas and guilty pleas. Third, it presents the reasoning set forth by the majority and the dissent. Lastly, the note provides an analysis of the Court’s reasoning, and explores how the Court was able to rule in Jeanette’s favor notwithstanding the plain language of the Slayer Statute that appeared to call for just the opposite ruling.