In Re Estate of McFayden

The issue in this appeal is whether a testamentary cash devise to a longtime friend should be reduced by the value of the decedent’s inter vivos gifts to that friend.

We hold there should be no reduction in the testamentary cash devise and remand the cause to the district court with instructions.

The operative facts are not in dispute, but only the legal effect of writings by the donor, Richard J. McFayden. For Christmas of 1983, McFayden, a widower, gave a $780.70 fox fur stole to his longtime friend, Betty Jane Sample, a widow. In February 1984, McFayden was diagnosed as having terminal…