## Facts

- Conrad Peters and Marie Peters were married; they had no children together, but Marie had a son from a prior marriage, Joseph Skrok.
- Conrad suffered a stroke that left him physically impaired but mentally competent.
- Marie asked her sister, Sophia Gall (an insurance agent and notary public), to prepare wills for both spouses. Each will left the estate to the surviving spouse; if the spouse did not survive, the estate would pass to Joseph Skrok.
- On December 30, 1983, Sophia brought Conrad’s will to his hospital room. Sophia, her husband, and Marie were present. Sophia read the will to Conrad; Conrad agreed to it and signed it.
- No one present at that time signed the will as an attesting witness.
- Later the same day, two office employees (Mary Elizabeth Gall and Kristen Spock) came to the hospital to act as witnesses. Conrad acknowledged his signature and the will’s contents in their presence.
- Despite observing the acknowledgment, neither employee signed the will. Sophia signed the document as a notary, not as an attesting witness.
- Fifteen months later, Marie died. About five days later, Conrad died. Conrad had no surviving relatives, so if he died intestate his estate would pass to the State of New Jersey by escheat.
- Joseph Skrok offered Conrad’s will for probate. The Middlesex County Surrogate denied probate because the will lacked signatures of two witnesses.
- In Superior Court, Law Division, the court ordered the State to show cause and admitted the will to probate, treating Sophia’s notary signature as a witness signature and permitting one employee to sign as a witness about 18 months after the hospital acknowledgment and after Conrad’s death.
- The Appellate Division reversed, holding the will invalid for failure to satisfy the statutory attestation requirement.
- Joseph’s estate pursued an appeal as of right to the Supreme Court of New Jersey from the divided Appellate Division decision.

## Issues

1. Whether N.J.S.A. 3B:3-2 permits a person who observed the testator sign or acknowledge a will to sign as an attesting witness after the testator’s death (and, more generally, how long after execution/acknowledgment a witness may sign).
2. Whether a probate court may use equitable power or a substantial-compliance theory to validate a will that was never signed by two attesting witnesses during the testator’s lifetime.

## Decision

- The Supreme Court of New Jersey affirmed the Appellate Division.
- N.J.S.A. 3B:3-2 does not allow attesting witnesses to supply required witness signatures after the testator’s death.
- The court rejected the trial court’s effort to cure the missing attestation through equity or substantial compliance where the will lacked the required witness subscriptions.
- Because the statutory execution formalities were not met, Conrad’s document was not a valid will and was not admitted to probate.

## Legal Principles

- Under N.J.S.A. 3B:3-2 (for non-holographic wills), a will must be in writing, signed by the testator (or at the testator’s direction), and signed by at least two individuals who witnessed the signing or the testator’s acknowledgment of the signature or the will.
- The witness-signature requirement contemplates a reasonably contemporaneous act tied to the witnessing; a signature placed after the testator’s death cannot satisfy the statute.
- Courts may not dispense with or rewrite will-execution formalities on equitable grounds, even where the result defeats apparent testamentary intent or avoids escheat.
- Substantial compliance, to the extent available, cannot cure the total absence of the two statutorily required witness subscriptions during the testator’s lifetime.
- Will-execution formalities serve evidentiary and cautionary functions: they help prove authenticity and reduce risks of fraud, mistake, and coercion; permitting post-death witness signatures would weaken those functions.

## Conclusion

In *Estate of Peters*, the New Jersey Supreme Court held that a will signed by the testator but never signed by two attesting witnesses before the testator’s death is invalid under N.J.S.A. 3B:3-2, and a court cannot validate the document by allowing a witness to sign long after execution and after the testator has died, even to carry out the testator’s apparent intent or to avoid escheat to the State.


Estate of Peters, 526 A.2d 1005 (1987)