Prove It to Win It: How to prove your Trust or Will contest case at trial

In this video, partner Keith A. Davidson discusses the type of evidence that you will need to prove your case at trial.

The following is a transcript of this video:

In this video, I want to discuss a little a bit about how do you prove your case at time of trial. So if you’re a trust beneficiary and you’re trying to overturn a trust, or overturn a will, you have the burden of proof. Which means you have to come into court with admissible evidence. Admissible evidence is a little different from just basic information. So you might know somebody who maybe talked to your parent and maybe your parent told that person many times that they wanted you to benefit from the estate. But that testimony of that person may or may not be admissible.

To begin with, that would be hearsay. It’s an out of court statement that you’re now trying to use to prove the truth of the matter in court. That’s basically hearsay. There are exceptions to hearsay and that’s where lawyers come in and we’re able to figure out is that something we can get into evidence or is it not? But every piece of evidence you present, whether it’s a document, whether it’s a witness, anything, it must meet the Rules of Evidence. And that’s why going to trial is a little tricky and it takes a lot of preparation and time to get ready for trial because you have to know how you’re going to get your evidence admitted and how you’re going to block, maybe, some bad evidence from the other side. And if you don’t plan that out ahead of time, it becomes very difficult to do at time of trial.

So as you’re heading into your trust or will contest trial, you really have to think about what type of evidence do you have, how are you going to get it admitted into evidence, and then once you do that, is it enough to persuade a judge to rule in your favor? And so those are some of the challenges that you’re going to have as a trust beneficiary going into trial.