Death Must Be Caused Willfully To Invoke Slayer Statute

The Mississippi Supreme Court has held that a person found not incompetent to stand trial on charges that he had murdered his mother is not necessarily precluded from recovery by the Slayer Statute.

Based upon this Court’s holding that the Slayer Statute requires a finding of willful conduct in order to preclude a person from inheriting from his or her victim, this judgment is reversed and the case is remanded for a hearing to determine John’s mental status at the time of the murder and whether he wilfully caused Joan’s death. The Slayer Statute will be applicable only if it is proven that, at the time of the murder, John’s actions were willful. The chancellor is instructed that “ all evidence which will throw any light on the issue of whether or not this killing was willful is competent and admissible.” Henry, 50 So. 2d at 923.

The facts

John R. Armstrong, a severely mentally ill man, killed Joan Armstrong, his eighty-year-old mother. This fact is not disputed by any party. The Circuit Court of Jackson County determined that John was not competent to stand trial for the murder of Joan, and John was committed to the state hospital at Whitfield, where he resides today. Based on the Slayer Statute, John’s four siblings requested that the devise to John in their mother’s will be declared void.

...On August 7, 2010, Joan Armstrong was contacted by several of her son’s neighbors, who were worried about their children’s safety, after they noticed John acting erratically. John had a long history of serious mental illness, having been treated since 1989.1 Joan picked up John at his apartment and brought him back to her condominium. Joan had invited some of her friends to come over to the condominium swimming pool. Worried that his mother was leaving him, John went upstairs and retrieved a crochet-covered brick, which he used to hit Joan repeatedly over the head. He then moved her body to the bathroom and repeatedly stabbed her. He informed law enforcement officers from the Ocean Springs Police Department (OSPD) that he was preparing her body to be buried by bleeding her.

He is being held pending a finding that he is competent to be tried. (Mike Frisch)