Goodwin v. White

Alvey, J., delivered the opinion of the Court. In this case the bill was filed to have vacated a deed from Mary M. Disney to Julia A. Disney, made on the ⁵⁰⁵ 19th of July, 1876, for an undivided half of a small farm, the interest conveyed supposed to he worth from $800 to $900. The consideration mentioned in the deed is only $50. After the deed was made Mary M. Disney, the grantor, married James L. Goodwin, and Julia A. Disney, the grantee, married A. A. White; and' Goodwin and wife filed a hill against White and wife.

Since the institution of the suit and the taking of the testimony, hut before the hearing in the Court below, the wife of Goodwin died, leaving surviving her one child, who was made a party plaintiff in the place of the mother. The grounds upon which the deed is sought to be vacated are fraud and undue influence on the part of the grantee in the deed. It is alleged in the bill that the grantor was invited to visit the grantee in the City of Baltimore, and was induced by the latter to go with her to an attorney’s office where the deed was already prepared to be executed, the same having been prepared at the instance of the grantee. It is further alleged that the deed was executed under a false impression as to the nature and import of the instrument; that the deed was signed and acknowledged in the belief and confidence that it was simply a power of attorney to authorize the aunt, the grantee in the deed, to rent out and receive the rents from the farm; and that it was not until some time after-wards that she, the grantor, discovered the real nature of the instrument, and how she had been deceived and imposed upon.

The defendants, in their answer, utterly deny all fraud and imposition, and claim and insist that the deed was the free and voluntary act of the grantor, and was executed without solicitation or influence of any kind whatever, on the part of the grantee,—the grantor well knowing and understanding the true nature of her act. The relation of the parties to the deed was that of aunt and niece, the latter, the grantor, being about twenty-three years of age, and the former about thirty. ⁵⁰⁶ It appears that two sisters, Louisa Disney and Julia A. Disney, were the owners in fee, as tenants in common, of the small farm in question. Louisa Disney died in March, 1876, leaving a will, by which she devised and bequeathed all her property, real and personal, to her niece Mary M. Disney, and if the niece should die without heirs or heir, then over to the sister, Julia A. Disney. Mary M. Disney as an orphan child had lived with and been reared up by her two aunts.

It is disclosed in the testimony that the niece had become interested in and contemplated marriage with James L. Groodwin, to whom she was subsequently married, and that both the aunts were very strongly opposed to the match; and we gather from the evidence that it was upon the promise of the niece to the deceased aunt that she would not marry Groodwin that the property was left to her. The will, however, makes no reference to such promise. In the first place, it is contended that the grantee in the deed was in such relation to the grantor as to exercise control and dominion over the latter, and that, from the nature of the transaction and all the circumstances attending it, it is but reasonable to presume that the deed was the result of such dominion over the mind of the grantor. And in respect to such contention it is only necessary to say, that if it were true, as contended by the plaintiffs, that the grantee in the deed had placed herself in loco parentis towards the grantor, and had abused the confidence inspired by that relation, in obtaining the deed, a Court of equity would not hesitate a moment in undoing what had been so unworthily procured to be done.

But we have examined the record in vain to find satisfactory evidence of any such confidential relation subsisting between the parties at or near the time of the transaction. The grantee was, and had been for some time previous to the making of the- deed, living in the City of Baltimore with her brother-in-law, and the grantor was living at the time ⁵⁰⁷ in Anne Arundel County, with her uncle ; and they only met occasionally. Moreover, the proof clearly shows that the idea of conveying the property to the aunt originated with the grantor herself, without a suggestion from the grantee, if the proof is to he relied on. But, as an independent ground of relief, it is alleged, and proved by the testimony of the grantor herself, that she was deceived and imposed on in the execution of the deed,-—that she supposed she was executing an entirely different instrument from what it turned out to he in fact.

Now, if that state of case were presented, supported by sufficient proof, it is needless to say that the Court would have no difficulty in declaring the deed a nullity. Where a party is deceived by the substitution of one instrument for another, or whose ignorance is .taken advantage of, and he is induced to do one thing when he intends and supposes he is doing another and' a