The Court refused to admit a solicitor's handwritten notes of testamentary instructions as an informal will under s 18 of the Succession Act 1981 (Qld), finding on the facts that the deceased did not intend the document to operate as his will but rather as instructions for a formal will to be prepared the following day. Critical to the outcome were findings that the solicitor told the deceased the document was not his will, did not clearly explain it could take interim testamentary effect, did not obtain a second witness because it was not intended as a will, and the deceased did not read the document carefully (failing to correct a known misspelling of his grandson's name). The Court also found that suspicious circumstances relating to the involvement of a beneficiary's mother in arranging the solicitor's attendance were satisfactorily explained by the evidence.
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