Showalter v. Spangle

Citations

• 93 Wash. 326
• 160 P. 1042
• 1916 Wash. LEXIS 1205

Syllabus

<p>Witnesses — Competency—Transaction With Persons Since Deceased. In an action to quiet title against two defendants, man and wife, claiming distinct properties through separate deeds of gift, as separate property, each of the defendants is entitled to testify on behalf of the other as to transactions had with the deceased, although disqualified in his or her own behalf, by Rem. 1915 Code, § 1211.</p> <p>Same. In such case, the interest of each spouse in the other’s separate property is prospective only, and does not disqualify.</p> <p>Deeds — Delivery—Intention—Evidence—-Sufficiency. The evidence is insufficient to show delivery of deeds of gift, in that no mutual intention presently to pass title was shown, where it appears that the grantor, in her last sickness, told her son that she was going to die, that in a box were two deeds, one for him and one for his wife, and requested that he take the box and “straighten up her affairs or her estate,” giving no direction as to the deeds apart from the other contents of the box; and that the son had a key to the box.</p> <p>Descent and Distribution — Rights of Heirs — Title—Statutes —Estoppel. The failure of heirs to complain of the omission of real estate from the inventory, does not estop them from claiming an interest as heirs, in view of Rem. 1915 Code, § 1366, whereby real estate descends to the heirs immediately on the death of the ancestor.</p>