Merrick v. Helter

OPINION

Bob Pemberton, Justice

Two days before J.C. Cole died in 2013, he signed a will that left no property to his only child, appellant Karla Merrick, and explicitly disinherited her. After Cole died and his will was admitted to probate, Merrick filed a contest seeking to invalidate the will and clear the way for her to inherit through intestate succession.1 Merrick’s principal theory was that her disinheritance by Cole violated “public policy”—namely Texas’s strong public policy against sexual abuse of children. As her factual predicate for that theory, Merrick alleged that Cole had abused…