February 2023 Flashcards
Insane-delusion rule
Under the insane delusion rule, a party contesting the will must show that at the time the will was executed, the testator was subject to an insane delusion, the testator unreasonably believed the insane delusion, and that the insane delusion influenced the will.
General Mental Capacity
The requirements to establish general mental capacity to execute a will are that the testator understands the extent of their estate, understands the natural bounty of their estate, understands the nature of the document being created, and reasonably understands the distribution of their estate.
Standing to contest a will
A relative has standing to contest a will when they can show they would have been a beneficiary absent the will. If a person dies without a will, an individual’s estate is governed by the intestacy laws of the state. Under intestacy, a person’s estate is generally distributed to their heirs. Absent a surviving spouse, a person’s estate is distributed equally among their issues.
Knock and Announce Rule
The issue is whether evidence should be excluded based on the officers’ failure to knock and announce.
The Fourth Amendment requires that, when executing a valid warrant at an individual’s home, officers must first knock and announce their presence, including their identity as law enforcement, before entering the residence, and give a reasonable amount of time for the residents to come to the door. Usually, evidence obtained in violation of a defendant’s Fourth Amendment rights is excluded from trial. However, failure to knock and announce does not result in exclusion of evidence under the Fourth Amendment
Evidence obtained in violation of Fourth Amendment
Evidence obtained in violation of the Fourth Amendment should be excluded from trial. Under the Fourth Amendment, law enforcement is permitted to conduct a stop and frisk to check for the presence of weapons. A pat down conducted as part of this type of a “Terry” stop and frisk does not require probable cause to search, but only reasonable suspicion that weapons or evidence of a crime may be present.
Reasonable suspicion can arise from an officer’s personal observations and experience. However, a pat down conducted based on reasonable suspicion must be limited to a check for weapons or for objects that could reasonably be believed to
contain evidence of a crime. An officer may not search a person or open any containers found on their person unless they are obvious as weapons or as vessels for evidence of a crime.
Illegal warrantless search
The search of a home usually requires a valid warrant that describes the place to be searched and the items sought in the search. The plain view doctrine provides an exception to the warrant requirement, however, when an item is out in the open and in the “plain view” of an officer and the criminal nature of an object is readily apparent without further searching.
Indemnification
Under the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure, a defendant may file a claim against a third party, naming it as a third-party defendant, based on the third party’s alleged obligation to indemnify (which means to reimburse) the defendant (called a third-party plaintiff) for any liability it has against the original plaintiff. In a case in federal court based on diversity jurisdiction, a claim against a third-party defendant must independently satisfy the requirements for federal jurisdiction, either by raising a federal question or satisfying the diversity jurisdiction requirements of an amount in controversy exceeding $75,000 and complete diversity between the third-party plaintiff and the third-party defendant. Contrary to the district court’s basis for granting the company’s motion to dismiss, whether the company is “necessary” to resolve the dispute is irrelevant to whether a third-party can be brought into an action; that standard is for Rule 19 joinder based on the absence of a party necessary to afford complete relief. Third-party practice is based on the notion of indemnification.
Personal Jurisdiction
A court has personal jurisdiction over a party when the party has sufficient minimum contacts with the state such that exercising jurisdiction over the party comports with traditional notions of fair play and substantial justice. A party must purposefully avail itself of the protections of the state such that it could reasonably anticipate being haled into court in that state.
Further, the FRCP contain what’s called a “bulge provision” that allows for service and personal jurisdiction over certain joined parties even when they are outside the forum state’s personal jurisdiction. The bulge provision applies when a party is impleaded or joined as a third party. It provides for service of process within 100 miles of a courthouse, resulting in personal jurisdiction to be obtained by personal service even outside the forum’s borders
Immediate Appeal
When a court dismisses some, but not all, claims in an action, immediate appeal is usually not available under the final judgment rule. However, if a court determines that there is no reason for delay in appealing the dismissed claims and that allowing immediate appeal would further the efficient resolution of the case, the court may enter a partial final judgment authorizing a partial appeal.
Background of Security Interests
A security interest is one in which a secured party has certain rights to collateral offered by the debtor in exchange for providing value to the debtor. A security interest is not enforceable unless it “attaches.”
A security interest attaches when (1) the secured party transfers value to the debtor. This can be in the form of money, items, a loan, etc.; (2) the debtor has rights in the collateral that is offered in exchange for the value received from the secured party; and (3) there is a security agreement OR possession/control of the collateral by the secured party.
In order to be valid, a security agreement must be (a) a record, but need not be a formal record. An acknowledgement letter on company letterhead may be a record; (b) authenticated, meaning it is signed by the party that the security interest is enforced upon. Company letterhead may constitute authentication; and (c) include a description of the collateral. The description must be specific enough to reasonably determine the secured collateral. For instance “all my assets” is too general.
In order to perfect a security interest, a secured party can file a financing statement with their state’s central office. The financing statement must be signed by the parties, describe the collateral (even generally), and be filed correctly. However, some security interests perfect automatically. Purchase Money Security Interests (PMSIs) are those where the obligation to pay is secured by the item of collateral. In other words, when things are purchased on credit. A PMSI in consumer goods perfects automatically, but PMSIs in other tangible things like inventory, do not.
PMSI in consumer goods
A PMSI in consumer goods automatically perfects upon attachment. Further, a
financing deal or lease where the secured party retains title to the property until final
payment is made is still a secured transaction even if it is not worded as such. A court looks to the nature of the transaction and economic reality, as opposed to the specific words used in the agreement.
Financing agreement
If a debtor resides in a state other than the one where the security agreement is
entered, a financing agreement will only result in perfection if it is filed in the state of
residence of the debtor (not the state of residence of the collateral). In other words, a third party who wishes to understand a person’s security interests should only need to search the records of the debtor’s home state to ascertain all interests.
Adverse Possession
In order to adversely possess property, an individual must possess the property in a manner that is continuous, actual, open and notorious, hostile, and exclusive for a specific amount of time. The relevant statute in this jurisdiction states that the amount of time for adverse possession is 10 years. An action to recover title accrues when the adverse possessor begins their possession of the land.
Generally, an individual is only entitled to take property by adverse possession that the individual actually occupied. However, when an individual enters property under the color of title, and that title turns out to be invalid, that individual can typically take, through adverse possession, the entirety of the property.
Relevance
Evidence is typically admissible so long as it is relevant in that it is both probative and material. To satisfy these criteria, evidence must make a fact more or less likely to be true and that fact must be of consequence to the litigation. The offered evidence must also not be excluded other any other rules of evidence. In this, statements relating to guilty pleas are generally inadmissible on public policy grounds outside of limited circumstances.
Hearsay
Hearsay is an out of court statement offered to prove the truth of the matter asserted. Hearsay statements are generally inadmissible. However, exceptions exist for this general rule, including statements made by an unavailable witness which were given as prior testimony and which the opposing party had an opportunity to cross examine.
