California Bar Exam (July 2013) thread Forum

[chocolateicecream]

My Mini Review says that the witnesses don't need to sign in the presence of each other, just that they must either see T sign the will or have acknowledged his signature on the will at the same time for it to be valid. They just need to sign before he dies.

I didn't realize this though. I said it wasn't validly executed because they both weren't present at signing, but it was okay because of the harmless error rule.

[Mroberts3]

95% sure the will was valid. Both witnesses were jointly present to see T acknowledge his signature and knew that it was T's will. The failure to sign until the next day for one witness doesn't matter because it was still within T's lifetime. Interested other witness does not invalidate will (only raises presumption that her gift was undue influence).

[spartjdawg]

If he didn't sign in their presence, he must expressly or impliedly acknowledge his signature to them before they sign (like saying it is right here, pointing at it).

An acknowledgement that a person signed something versus a legal acknowledgement for a will are two different things. The witnesses did not sign a will with an acknowledgement. They did not sign in T's presence, nor did they acknowledge the document in an acknowledgement.

Does anyone else think that a valid will would have been way too easy?

[TaipeiMort]

Haha, yeah, the wills essay confused me to no end. I was like, "There's a valid will, the interested witness maybe shouldn't take under it, everyone else is good, holographic codicil also good, the first wife's death doesn't matter, what's more to say?"

Seriously, what else was there? I couldn't figure it out and left this morning thinking that between that and spending 40 minutes trying to figure out what intentional torts I was forgetting instead of focusing on weird remedies, I had failed for sure.

I don't think there was much more to say.
Interested witness but no facts to indicate undue influence, but even if not valid bc of witnesses/sig stuff --> it's valid holo codicil that validated it, and that clarified his his current wife gets stuff at death. Only other thing was "stepson" usage in will I analyzed. Said dont know if adopted, but even if not, he obviously thought about will changes with codicil, so I said the kid still takes, and also easy extrinsic evidence to figure out who stepson was. But I mean, what else was there? I ended up telling everything I knew about testamentary capacity, testamentary intent, etc. Small into on CA = CP state so you can only will away 1/2 of CP, etc.
I don't know, was there some hidden issue in there?

Interested witnesses requires two disinterested witnesses or under influence presumption
Lapse issue for first wife (if anti-lapse statute, stepson would inherit)
Stepson not an issue of Ted unless parent-child relationship established.
What happens if the will is not valid.
What does inserting Bertha into the agreement do to the orginal agreement (BS argument, Bertha might argue that his CP from the first marriage should be devised as well because he wanted her to succeed into it).

[softey]

does anyone who has been on baressays generally know what a 55 vs 60 vs 65 PT looks like

[softey]

Haha, yeah, the wills essay confused me to no end. I was like, "There's a valid will, the interested witness maybe shouldn't take under it, everyone else is good, holographic codicil also good, the first wife's death doesn't matter, what's more to say?"

Seriously, what else was there? I couldn't figure it out and left this morning thinking that between that and spending 40 minutes trying to figure out what intentional torts I was forgetting instead of focusing on weird remedies, I had failed for sure.

I don't think there was much more to say.
Interested witness but no facts to indicate undue influence, but even if not valid bc of witnesses/sig stuff --> it's valid holo codicil that validated it, and that clarified his his current wife gets stuff at death. Only other thing was "stepson" usage in will I analyzed. Said dont know if adopted, but even if not, he obviously thought about will changes with codicil, so I said the kid still takes, and also easy extrinsic evidence to figure out who stepson was. But I mean, what else was there? I ended up telling everything I knew about testamentary capacity, testamentary intent, etc. Small into on CA = CP state so you can only will away 1/2 of CP, etc.
I don't know, was there some hidden issue in there?

Interested witnesses requires two disinterested witnesses or under influence presumption
Lapse issue for first wife (if anti-lapse statute, stepson would inherit)
Stepson not an issue of Ted unless parent-child relationship established.
What happens if the will is not valid.
What does inserting Bertha into the agreement do to the orginal agreement (BS argument, Bertha might argue that his CP from the first marriage should be devised as well because he wanted her to succeed into it).

stepson wouldnt inherit bc CP passes to survivor on death -- hence hers passed to him on her death

[worldtraveler]

I didn't think the will was valid but I couldn't remember what to do with the different interests if it was invalid so I just said it was valid and went from there. Do not regret it.

[TaipeiMort]

If he didn't sign in their presence, he must expressly or impliedly acknowledge his signature to them before they sign (like saying it is right here, pointing at it).

An acknowledgement that a person signed something versus a legal acknowledgement for a will are two different things. The witnesses did not sign a will with an acknowledgement. They did not sign in T's presence, nor did they acknowledge the document in an acknowledgement.

Does anyone else think that a valid will would have been way too easy?

The best argument against the Will was presumption of under influence.
I don't think conscious presence applies.

I am pretty sure that he just needs to expressly or impliedly acknowledge his signature in a method like saying "thats my signature." I saw it on a previous model essay.

[mrpickles]

Haha, yeah, the wills essay confused me to no end. I was like, "There's a valid will, the interested witness maybe shouldn't take under it, everyone else is good, holographic codicil also good, the first wife's death doesn't matter, what's more to say?"

Seriously, what else was there? I couldn't figure it out and left this morning thinking that between that and spending 40 minutes trying to figure out what intentional torts I was forgetting instead of focusing on weird remedies, I had failed for sure.

I don't think there was much more to say.
Interested witness but no facts to indicate undue influence, but even if not valid bc of witnesses/sig stuff --> it's valid holo codicil that validated it, and that clarified his his current wife gets stuff at death. Only other thing was "stepson" usage in will I analyzed. Said dont know if adopted, but even if not, he obviously thought about will changes with codicil, so I said the kid still takes, and also easy extrinsic evidence to figure out who stepson was. But I mean, what else was there? I ended up telling everything I knew about testamentary capacity, testamentary intent, etc. Small into on CA = CP state so you can only will away 1/2 of CP, etc.
I don't know, was there some hidden issue in there?

Interested witnesses requires two disinterested witnesses or under influence presumption
Lapse issue for first wife (if anti-lapse statute, stepson would inherit)
Stepson not an issue of Ted unless parent-child relationship established.
What happens if the will is not valid.
What does inserting Bertha into the agreement do to the orginal agreement (BS argument, Bertha might argue that his CP from the first marriage should be devised as well because he wanted her to succeed into it).

stepson wouldnt inherit bc CP passes to survivor on death -- hence hers passed to him on her death

yeah I know I said undue influence, I just did a short analysis there though, no facts, I concluded nothing to show undue influence, assuming he could overcome he'd take.

[spartjdawg]

does anyone who has been on baressays generally know what a 55 vs 60 vs 65 PT looks like

Generally, a 45 to a 50 is a big difference. 50 to 55 is not anywhere near as big. Same for 55 to 60 and so on and so forth.

My Monday PT is going to be very, very, bad.

[neilu789]

If he didn't sign in their presence, he must expressly or impliedly acknowledge his signature to them before they sign (like saying it is right here, pointing at it).

An acknowledgement that a person signed something versus a legal acknowledgement for a will are two different things. The witnesses did not sign a will with an acknowledgement. They did not sign in T's presence, nor did they acknowledge the document in an acknowledgement.

Does anyone else think that a valid will would have been way too easy?

Yeah, I left that essay thinking that it was too straightforward also, but in hindsight there was plenty to talk about with the witnesses, the holographic codicil, the the integration/incorporation by reference, etc.

Also, I think it would have been weird that the fact included the phrase "look that is my signature" or whatever it said if that didn't have some effect on the validity of the will.

[mrpickles]

does anyone who has been on baressays generally know what a 55 vs 60 vs 65 PT looks like

Generally, a 45 to a 50 is a big difference. 50 to 55 is not anywhere near as big. Same for 55 to 60 and so on and so forth.

My Monday PT is going to be very, very, bad.

I have one. To be honest, 65's aren't anything special. But after actually taking the bar, I completely understand how you can either 1) miss issues and 2) write 80s and still fail because of MBE (as in, the 80s on baressays.com, yet those people still failed)

[Tangerine Gleam]

.

[TaipeiMort]

Haha, yeah, the wills essay confused me to no end. I was like, "There's a valid will, the interested witness maybe shouldn't take under it, everyone else is good, holographic codicil also good, the first wife's death doesn't matter, what's more to say?"

Seriously, what else was there? I couldn't figure it out and left this morning thinking that between that and spending 40 minutes trying to figure out what intentional torts I was forgetting instead of focusing on weird remedies, I had failed for sure.

I don't think there was much more to say.
Interested witness but no facts to indicate undue influence, but even if not valid bc of witnesses/sig stuff --> it's valid holo codicil that validated it, and that clarified his his current wife gets stuff at death. Only other thing was "stepson" usage in will I analyzed. Said dont know if adopted, but even if not, he obviously thought about will changes with codicil, so I said the kid still takes, and also easy extrinsic evidence to figure out who stepson was. But I mean, what else was there? I ended up telling everything I knew about testamentary capacity, testamentary intent, etc. Small into on CA = CP state so you can only will away 1/2 of CP, etc.
I don't know, was there some hidden issue in there?

Interested witnesses requires two disinterested witnesses or under influence presumption
Lapse issue for first wife (if anti-lapse statute, stepson would inherit)
Stepson not an issue of Ted unless parent-child relationship established.
What happens if the will is not valid.
What does inserting Bertha into the agreement do to the orginal agreement (BS argument, Bertha might argue that his CP from the first marriage should be devised as well because he wanted her to succeed into it).

stepson wouldnt inherit bc CP passes to survivor on death -- hence hers passed to him on her death

If there was an anti-lapse statute, the stepson would get the dad's half of community property instead of Bertha from the dad-Bertha marriage. He can decide where his half of CP goes, and he wanted to give that gift to his son. However, this argument would be based on the idea that "CP" referred to general CP, and not CP from the first wife- Dad marriage. I know this was a stretch, but it seemed the right thing to do at the time.

[huckabees]

does NCBE ever throw out questions that are too whack?

On adaptibar one old official question had two accepted answers.

Kind of late in the game to address this, but I think the reason was because the law of mistake had changed in the meantime.

What did people think of today's PT?

[spartjdawg]

does NCBE ever throw out questions that are too whack?

On adaptibar one old official question had two accepted answers.

Kind of late in the game to address this, but I think the reason was because the law of mistake had changed in the meantime.

What did people think of today's PT?

I felt pretty good about it. If I get a 50 on Monday's I will be astonished.

[huckabees]

does NCBE ever throw out questions that are too whack?

On adaptibar one old official question had two accepted answers.

Kind of late in the game to address this, but I think the reason was because the law of mistake had changed in the meantime.

What did people think of today's PT?

I felt pretty good about it. If I get a 50 on Monday's I will be astonished.

Seriously, can anyone with bar essays please describe what a 45, 50, and 55 for a PT looks like? What do unfinished PTs get?

[cavalierattitude]

I had this at first but remembered my 1L Torts prof harping on the idea that failure to comply with industry standard shows negligence but compliance with industry standard doesn't show absence of negligence because the standard itself could be unreasonable. Something about glass shower doors not made of safety glass.

That is industry standard for non-professional fields.

Ahh. Oh well.

[cavalierattitude]

Haha, yeah, the wills essay confused me to no end. I was like, "There's a valid will, the interested witness maybe shouldn't take under it, everyone else is good, holographic codicil also good, the first wife's death doesn't matter, what's more to say?"

Seriously, what else was there? I couldn't figure it out and left this morning thinking that between that and spending 40 minutes trying to figure out what intentional torts I was forgetting instead of focusing on weird remedies, I had failed for sure.

I don't think there was much more to say.
Interested witness but no facts to indicate undue influence, but even if not valid bc of witnesses/sig stuff --> it's valid holo codicil that validated it, and that clarified his his current wife gets stuff at death. Only other thing was "stepson" usage in will I analyzed. Said dont know if adopted, but even if not, he obviously thought about will changes with codicil, so I said the kid still takes, and also easy extrinsic evidence to figure out who stepson was. But I mean, what else was there? I ended up telling everything I knew about testamentary capacity, testamentary intent, etc. Small into on CA = CP state so you can only will away 1/2 of CP, etc.
I don't know, was there some hidden issue in there?

Interested witnesses requires two disinterested witnesses or under influence presumption
Lapse issue for first wife (if anti-lapse statute, stepson would inherit)
Stepson not an issue of Ted unless parent-child relationship established.
What happens if the will is not valid.
What does inserting Bertha into the agreement do to the orginal agreement (BS argument, Bertha might argue that his CP from the first marriage should be devised as well because he wanted her to succeed into it).

How is there a lapse issue? He didn't leave any devise to W when he died, the codicil changed it to B.
He also didn't have any CP from the first marriage. His estate was $300,000 of CP with B and $300,000 of SP in the bank.

[mrpickles]

Seriously, can anyone with bar essays please describe what a 45, 50, and 55 for a PT looks like? What do unfinished PTs get?

If you handwrite, you get away with murder. Is what I've seen. But the PT's do vary on 65 from year to year. Sometimes I look and I'm like THAT got a 65??? and then sometimes its "that ONLY got a 65?" - which leads me to believe they do discuss the difficulty of them in their grading calibration meetings.

[huckabees]

Seriously, can anyone with bar essays please describe what a 45, 50, and 55 for a PT looks like? What do unfinished PTs get?

If you handwrite, you get away with murder. Is what I've seen. But the PT's do vary on 65 from year to year. Sometimes I look and I'm like THAT got a 65??? and then sometimes its "that ONLY got a 65?" - which leads me to believe they do discuss the difficulty of them in their grading calibration meetings.

LOL what is enough for a 50?

And yeah, I heard that hand writing in general is graded with much more leniency.

[mrpickles]

Haha, yeah, the wills essay confused me to no end. I was like, "There's a valid will, the interested witness maybe shouldn't take under it, everyone else is good, holographic codicil also good, the first wife's death doesn't matter, what's more to say?"

Seriously, what else was there? I couldn't figure it out and left this morning thinking that between that and spending 40 minutes trying to figure out what intentional torts I was forgetting instead of focusing on weird remedies, I had failed for sure.

I don't think there was much more to say.
Interested witness but no facts to indicate undue influence, but even if not valid bc of witnesses/sig stuff --> it's valid holo codicil that validated it, and that clarified his his current wife gets stuff at death. Only other thing was "stepson" usage in will I analyzed. Said dont know if adopted, but even if not, he obviously thought about will changes with codicil, so I said the kid still takes, and also easy extrinsic evidence to figure out who stepson was. But I mean, what else was there? I ended up telling everything I knew about testamentary capacity, testamentary intent, etc. Small into on CA = CP state so you can only will away 1/2 of CP, etc.
I don't know, was there some hidden issue in there?

Interested witnesses requires two disinterested witnesses or under influence presumption
Lapse issue for first wife (if anti-lapse statute, stepson would inherit)
Stepson not an issue of Ted unless parent-child relationship established.
What happens if the will is not valid.
What does inserting Bertha into the agreement do to the orginal agreement (BS argument, Bertha might argue that his CP from the first marriage should be devised as well because he wanted her to succeed into it).

How is there a lapse issue? He didn't leave any devise to W when he died, the codicil changed it to B.
He also didn't have any CP from the first marriage. His estate was $300,000 of CP with B and $300,000 of SP in the bank.

This was my interpretation of the facts. It specifically said the CP was "with B in the house" and then SP of 300k in bank.
Where was lapse? Did her name appear somewhere? Or did you say the codicil wasn't valid so that meant there was still old wife in will? (It was clearly codicil - only need 1) material provisions in handwriting, 2) signature (need not be full) and 3) date isn't needed (but he did, bonus!) if it's not, then just assumed to be before any dating things occurred.

[mrpickles]

Seriously, can anyone with bar essays please describe what a 45, 50, and 55 for a PT looks like? What do unfinished PTs get?

If you handwrite, you get away with murder. Is what I've seen. But the PT's do vary on 65 from year to year. Sometimes I look and I'm like THAT got a 65??? and then sometimes its "that ONLY got a 65?" - which leads me to believe they do discuss the difficulty of them in their grading calibration meetings.

LOL what is enough for a 50?

And yeah, I heard that hand writing in general is graded with much more leniency.

I mean a 50 is like you didn't do sections, maybe you created 3 main sections, and hand walls of text between where you just repeated facts from your own file. Is what I've seen before. But I've also seen 65s that wrote on the wrong thing. I've seen an evidence question where the guy talked about 5th Amend - when it didn't apply - but nonetheless concluded that a statement against interest was the same as a party admission (it's not).
65
Don't worry. I've also seen a LOT of made up law on those things that pass. They want to see you 1) spot issue, 2) say some general rule with it, 3) apply the relevant facts [as in repeat the facts that apply there, not just reference whatever general fact it was. ie, facts tell us he wanted to go, no, you'd say we know he wanted to go because he opened the door, did this, did that, blah blah], come to a conclusion based on that analysis

I've seen multiple causes of action made up on passing papers

[M2izzie]

Anyone else use the January 1st, 2009 exception the witnessing requirements of a validly attested will?

[Tangerine Gleam]

.