Article 1143
A will made by a person who lacks or has limited capacity for civil conduct is invalid.
The will must express the true intention of the testator, and the will made by fraud or coercion is invalid.
A forged will is invalid.
If the will is tampered with, the tampered content is invalid.
1. The main purpose of this article
This article is about the circumstances in which a will is invalid.
II. Evolution of the Provisions
This provision is derived from Article 22 of the original Inheritance Law, which states that "a will made by an incapacitated person or a person with limited capacity shall be invalid." The will must express the true intention of the testator, and the will made under duress or deception is invalid. A forged will is invalid. If the will is tampered with, the tampered content is invalid. "In order to unify the concept of law, this article has made individual adjustments to the legal terminology. Amend "incapacitated or limited capacity" to "incapacitated or limited civil capacity";
3. Interpretation of Provisions
This article is about the invalidity of wills.
Invalid will means that the will cannot be legally effective because it does not comply with the law. The consequence of the invalidity of the will is that the testator's intention to dispose of his property in the will is invalid, the estate of the decedent cannot be disposed of in accordance with the will, the testator's intention in the will cannot be realized, and the legal consequences expected by the testator do not occur.
The grounds for the invalidity of a will under this section are:
(1) A will made by a person who lacks or has limited capacity for civil conduct. If a person with full capacity for civil conduct is declared to be a person with no capacity for civil conduct or a person with limited capacity for civil conduct after the establishment of a will, his original will is still valid, but if he changes or withdraws the original will after the change of his or her civil capacity, the modification or revocation of the will is invalid.
(2) A will established under duress or fraud is not an expression of the testator's true intentions, and lacks the legal requirements of a will, so it is invalid. For a will made under duress or fraud, the testator may revoke the will by making another will, a factual act or a legal act during his lifetime; It should be noted that although a will established under duress or fraud is also a civil legal act, it does not apply to the provisions of Articles 148~150 of the Civil Code, and is not a revocable civil juristic act, but an invalid civil juristic act.
(3) Forgery of wills and making wills on behalf of others. This refers to a will that is created in the name of the decedent, but is not at all an expression of the will of the decedent. As long as the will is not expressed by the testator and is made in the name of the testator, it is a forged will, regardless of its content and whether it harms the interests of the heirs, it is invalid.
(4) The contents of the will that have been tampered with. The content of the will has been changed by someone other than the testator, which is a modification, abridgement, supplement, etc. The content of the will that has been tampered with is no longer an expression of the testator's will, but an expression of the intention of the tamperer, so it does not have the effect of the will and is invalid. The will cannot be invalid in its entirety because it has been tampered with, and the content of the will that has not been tampered with is still the true expression of the testator's intention and is still valid.
4. Cases
Zhang Jia et al. v. Zhang Ding et al., a legal inheritance dispute
Facts: Zhang Jia, Zhang Ding, Zhang Liang, etc., were half-siblings, half-siblings, and siblings, respectively, and their parents were Zhang XX and Xing XX, Xing XX died in 1998, and Zhang XX died in 2008. Zhang Xin was the daughter of Zhang Liang, who died before her father. Zhang Moumou and Xing Moumou had three private houses before their deaths. On October 13, 2010, Zhang Ding signed a demolition compensation and resettlement agreement for a house under Zhang's name, replacing the house with a building, and paying 11,250 yuan for the house. On December 13, 2016, Zhang Ding paid an inheritance and name change fee of 2,000 yuan to change the name of the building to his own name. Zhang Ding contributed 100,000 yuan to Zhang A and ten other people on the issue of the house under Zhang's name, and the ten of them divided it according to the agreement. At the beginning of 2017, regarding the relocation of the bungalow under Zhang's name, the sub-district office where he was located paid 101,550 yuan in compensation for the house, and Zhang Jia and six others believed that this money was the inheritance of their parents and asked for division. The court of first instance found that on May 1, 2005, Zhang Moumou had made a will to give all the private houses to Zhang Ding, and Zhang Ding would be responsible for all expenses in the future. The other children all agreed and signed, Zhang XX put his fingerprint on his name, the plaintiff and the defendant both signed and put their fingerprints on their own or had others sign on their behalf, and the other witnesses, Li Mouchen and Zhang Mouping, signed and put their fingerprints on their signatures. Therefore, the three houses of the decedent Zhang and Xing were handled according to testamentary inheritance, and the litigation request of Zhang A and the other six people to divide the decedent's estate according to the statutory inheritance was not supported. In the second instance, the court verified that the will was written by the heir Zhang Yi after the death of the decedent Zhang Moumou, and he signed Zhang Moumou's name and fingerprint at the testator, so the will did not have the effect of a testament and the court did not accept it. The estates of Zhang and Xing should be divided equally by their children in accordance with the provisions of the law on statutory inheritance and subrogation.
5. Analysis
In this case, the will involved in the case was written by the heir Zhang Yi after the death of the decedent Zhang Moumou, and he signed the name of Zhang Moumou and pressed his fingerprint at the testator, which was actually a forged will. According to the legal provisions of the Inheritance Law in force at the time of the case on the invalidity of forged wills, in the case where the decedent is intestate and the legal heirs have not lost the right of inheritance, according to the specific circumstances of the case, the estate of the decedent in this case shall be divided among the heirs in accordance with the rules of statutory inheritance and subrogation. The court of first instance erred in recognizing the legality and validity of the will when all the plaintiffs did not recognize the authenticity of the plaintiff's signature in the will, and all the defendants also admitted that they themselves or had entrusted others to sign the will. According to the provisions of the Inheritance Law on the form of wills, self-written wills must be written by the testator himself/herself, and the written will must be signed by the testator himself and meet the conditions of witnesses in order to be valid.