Downing v. Downing

CHASANOW, Judge.

In 1948, Helen Downing (Helen) and her husband John Downing (John Sr.) bought an 88-acre farm in Carroll County, Maryland. They had two children, John Robert Downing (John Jr.) and Bonnie Lynn Downing (Bonnie). When John Sr. died, Helen became the sole owner of the family farm.

On August 7, 1972, several years after John Sr.’s death, Helen conveyed the farm to a “straw man,” 1 Stanford Hoff, “his heirs and assigns forever in fee simple.” Hoff immediately reconveyed the property “unto HELEN S. DOWNING, widow, and JOHN ROBERT DOWNING, as joint tenants, their heirs and assigns,…