## Facts

- Fermin Gonzalez completed a commercially available preprinted will form by handwriting beneficiaries, property dispositions, and funeral instructions into blank spaces and signing the document.
- The signed document was not witnessed, so it did not satisfy the formalities for an attested will.
- Gonzalez planned to prepare a neater “clean copy” on a fresh form and have it witnessed; family members signed the blank form as witnesses, but Gonzalez died before copying terms onto it and signing it.
- Three daughters petitioned to probate the signed, unwitnessed completed form as Gonzalez’s will.
- Two other children, excluded by the document, objected and sought summary judgment, arguing the document failed as a holographic will because the testamentary language appeared only in preprinted text.
- The probate court admitted the signed completed form as a valid holographic will, finding the handwritten entries evidenced intent to adopt the printed language.

## Issues

1. Whether a signed, unwitnessed preprinted will form qualifies as a valid holographic will under Maine’s enactment of UPC § 2-502 when the testator handwrites the dispositive entries but the testamentary-intent language is preprinted.
2. Whether the “material provisions” handwriting requirement is satisfied when handwritten entries, read in context with the printed form, show testamentary intent and an intent to dispose of property at death.

## Decision

- The Supreme Judicial Court of Maine affirmed the probate court.
- The court held the executed document was not an attested will due to lack of witness signatures, but it was valid as a holographic will.
- The court concluded Gonzalez’s handwritten entries implicitly adopted and incorporated the preprinted text, satisfying the requirement that the material provisions be in his handwriting.
- The court admitted the signed completed form to probate as Gonzalez’s will.

## Legal Principles

- When a jurisdiction requires only the “material provisions” of a holographic will to be in the testator’s handwriting, the entire instrument need not be handwritten.
- Handwritten entries on a preprinted will form can satisfy holographic-will requirements if the handwritten portions supply the dispositive content and, in context, demonstrate testamentary intent.
- Testamentary intent may be determined from the instrument as a whole, including the context supplied by printed form language and other admissible evidence bearing on intent.
- Courts applying a functional approach to holographic wills may uphold a document that clearly reflects the decedent’s intent to make a posthumous transfer, absent indicia of fraud or improper influence.

## Conclusion

Maine’s high court upheld probate of a signed but unwitnessed preprinted will form as a holographic will, reasoning that the testator’s handwritten dispositions were the material provisions and, when read with the form’s printed language and surrounding circumstances, demonstrated intent to make a will.


In re Estate of Gonzalez, 855 A.2d 1146 (Me. 2004)