## Facts

- Maria Brind, anticipating a surgical operation to remove a tumor, deposited valuable jewelry with International Trust Company in Denver.
- She delivered a letter directing the trust company to distribute specified pieces of jewelry to named friends if she died “as a result of” the impending operation.
- The trust company received the jewelry and letter and agreed to act under the instructions.
- At the hospital, a surgeon made an incision but did not complete the contemplated operation after concluding it would be fatal.
- Maria survived the attempted operation and later died from the tumor.
- Evidence at trial included testimony that after leaving the hospital she visited the trust company and stated she still wanted the friends to receive the jewelry; her attorney testified she expressed uncertainty about changing the disposition.
- At Maria’s death, the trust company still possessed the jewelry.
- Maria’s husband, as administrator of her estate, sued the trust company in replevin to recover the jewelry; the named friends intervened, claiming the property as donees.

## Issues

1. Whether a gift causa mortis conditioned on death from a specified peril becomes effective when the donor survives that peril but later dies from a different cause.
2. Whether post-peril statements and inaction can convert an uncompleted gift causa mortis into a completed inter vivos gift or a renewed gift causa mortis.

## Decision

- The jury found for the intervening donees and upheld the transfer as a valid gift causa mortis.
- The Colorado Supreme Court reversed.
- The court held the attempted gift causa mortis was void because the donor did not die from the particular peril specified in the conditional instruction (death resulting from the impending operation).
- The jewelry was recoverable by the estate.

## Legal Principles

- A gift causa mortis is conditional and does not become absolute unless the donor dies from the illness or peril contemplated when the gift was made.
- If the donor survives the feared peril and later dies from another cause, the gift causa mortis is incomplete and fails, even if death is related to the donor’s general medical condition.
- Delivery to a third-party stakeholder can satisfy the delivery element of a gift causa mortis, but delivery alone does not complete the gift if the condition (death from the specified peril) is not met.
- General expressions of continued intent after the specified peril passes, without a clear present transfer, do not establish a completed inter vivos gift.

## Conclusion

The court enforced a strict condition-of-death requirement for gifts causa mortis: because Maria Brind did not die as a result of the contemplated operation identified in her instructions, the conditional transfer never vested, and the jewelry belonged to her estate.


Brind v. Int'l Tr. Co., 66 Colo. 60, 179 P. 148 (Colo. 1919)