Article on Illinois Trusts and Estates

Susan T. Bart (Sidley Austin LLP), Jennifer L. Bunker (Zukowski Law Offices) and Sonia D. Coleman (Law Office of Sonia D. Coleman) recently published an article entitled, Survey of Illinois Law: Trusts and Estates, 38 S. Ill. U. L.J. 615-648 (2014).  Provided below is a portion of the article’s introduction:

In Dehart v. Dehart, the Illinois Supreme Court adopted the legal doctrine of equitable adoption and clearly set forth the tests for other legal doctrines concerning will contests including: lack of testamentary capacity; undue influence; fraudulent inducement; and intentional interference with testamentary expectancy. Thus, DeHart is useful not only for the new law set forth therein, but it is also useful as an explanation of more established doctrines and an example of how they are applied.

Decedent, Donald M. DeHart, held Plaintiff, James Thomas DeHart, out to individuals and institutions as his son for more than sixty years, including listing Plaintiff as his son when making arrangements for his own funeral in May 2003.  In fact, Plaintiff, born in 1944, used a birth certificate listing the Decedent as his father throughout his lifetime until he was required in 2000 to obtain a certified copy of his birth certificate from the Cook County Office of Vital Statistics in order to obtain a passport. The certified birth certificate Plaintiff received did not list the Decedent’s name as his father but instead listed his father as James Thomas Staley, Sr. It also listed the Plaintiff’s name as James Thomas Staley, Jr.