Thielen v. Thielen
Thielen v. Thielen
Opinion of the Court
In this action plaintiff, as administrator of-the estate of his deceased mother, Regina May Thielen, sued to quiet title to certain real estate described in the complaint, and to have a deed made by said decedent to Lillian R. Thielen, and under which she claimed title to the property, canceled and annulled.
An appeal is prosecuted from the judgment entered in favor of defendant.
*313 As alleged in the complaint, the grounds upon which plaintiff sought the relief asked for were that at the time when deceased made and executed the deed she was of unsound mind and mentally incompetent to transfer the property, and that no legal delivery of the deed was ever at any time made.
As to both of these allegations, denied in the answer, the court, in accordance with the special verdict of the jury to which the issues were submitted, found adversely to plaintiff. Appellant challenges the findings, claiming the evidence is insufficient to support them.
It is apparent that neither the court nor the jury believed that plaintiff betrayed the confidence in him reposed by the grantor when she intrusted him with the deed, but that in giving it to Lillian he acted in accordance with her instructions. This conclusion finds ample support not only in the fact that Lillian’s possession of the deed as grantee therein constituted a prima facie showing of its delivery (Ward v. Dougherty, 75 Cal. 240, [7 Am. St. Rep. 151, 17 Pac. 193]; Devlin on Deeds, sec. 294), but there was much testimony, both f^om Lillian and disinterested witnesses, to the effect that deceased, prior to the execution of the deed, expressed her intention of giving the property to her daughter, and that after its execution she stated that' she had conveyed the same to Lillian. This evidence was’ not only competent (Williams v. Kidd, 170 Cal. 631, [Ann. Cas. 1916E, 703, 151 Pac. 1]), but the inferences fairly (Reducible therefrom and from the acts of plaintiff, among which was the fact that after giving the deed to his sister he asked her to mortgage the property for his benefit, strongly tended to prove that plaintiff, in delivering the deed to Lillian, acted in accordance with instructions given him by the grantor, who intended that it should be at once delivered for the purpose of divesting herself of the title and transferring it to her daughter. “It is essential to the validity of a transfer of real property that there be a 'delivery of the conveyance with intent to transfer the title, and the true test under which delivery is to be determined is in ascertaining whether in parting with the possession of, the conveyance the grantor intended thereby to divest himself of title.” (Williams v. Kidd, supra.) This question of intention is one of fact to be determined by the trial court from a consideration of all the evidence in a given case; and conceding in the instant case a conflict of evidence touching the issue, the finding of the jury, adopted by, the trial court, must be accepted as conclusive thereon.
The judgment is affirmed.
Conrey, P. J., and James, J., concurred.
Reference
- Full Case Name
- RALPH A. THIELEN, Administrator, Etc., Appellant, v. LILLIAN R. THIELEN, Respondent
- Cited By
- 1 case
- Status
- Published