Before Court en banc. Per Curiam Opinion.
In this appeal from an order denying enforcement of a testator's disinheritance clause, the Court was faced with three questions: (1) whether NRS 132.370 abolishes the common law rule against enforcement of disinheritance clauses when the testator fails at affirmatively devising his or her estate; (2) whether to adopt the doctrine of dependent relative revocation ("DRR"); and (3) whether an escheat is triggered when a testator disinherits all of his or her heirs. Answering the first question in the affirmative, the Court held that the "plain and unambiguous" language of NRS 132.370, which provides that a will includes "a testamentary instrument that . . . merely excludes or limits the right of an individual or class to succeed to property," abolishes the common law rule against the unenforceability of disinheritance clauses where the testator otherwise fails to affirmatively devise his or her estate. Regarding the second question, the Court expressly adopted the doctrine of DRR, which states that a court should disregard a revocation made in connection with a failed dispositive objection or erroneous assumption of law or fact when necessary to ensure that an estate is distributed according to the testator's intent. The Court noted that the doctrine was "sound," and that NRS 133.130, which restricts revival of a will, was a fundamentally different concept than the doctrine of DRR and thus did not prevent adoption of the doctrine. However, the Court declined to apply the doctrine in this case because the testator did not make a failed dispositive objection or erroneous assumption of law or fact. Finally, in answering yes to the third question, the Court held that an escheat is triggered when a testator disinherits all of his or her heirs because the testator leaves behind "no surviving spouse or kindred" under the plain meaning of NRS 134.120. Thus, the testator's estate escheated to the state for educational purposes. Reversed. (Rory T. Kay, Associate in the Las Vegas office of McDonald Carano Wilson.)
