Two nephews are locked in a ₤ 400,000 will combat over the fortune of a 'houseproud' widow, who disinherited one side of her household after they recommended she enter into a care home.

Doreen Stock, 86, passed away childless in 2021 and left her whole estate to her nephew, Simon Stock, and his other half Catherine, who lived only a couple of minutes from her south London home.

But her Michigan-based great-nephew, 39-year-old Ben Chiswick, has now introduced a bid to acquire the lot himself - regardless of not going to or even talking to her over the phone considering that his transfer to the US eight years earlier.

Propulsion engineer Mr Chiswick had actually been due to acquire her fortune under a previous will written nearly 40 years earlier in 1986 when he was a baby, but was dramatically disinherited by his great-aunt a year before her death.

The row emerged after his parents recommended Ms Stock invest time in a care home while they enjoyed a three-week vacation.

Fighting to restore the previous will, Mr Chiswick declares Ms Stock, who he says was a 'fixture in his childhood,' was too stricken by dementia to properly understand what she was doing when she altered her testament.

However, Simon and his spouse are battling the case, claiming Mr Chiswick - who has actually lived in the US because 2017 - had no 'significant relationship' with Ms Stock beyond his early years while Mr Stock had been 'the nearest thing to a child she had'.

Sitting at Central London County Court, Judge Jane Evans-Gordon heard that 'independent' and occasionally 'stubborn' Ms Stock had a deep emotional accessory to her home in Charminster Road, Mottingham, having shared it with her spouse Samuel till his death in 2001.

Ben Chiswick, 39, imagined right with dad Brent, is challenging Doreen Stock's will in the courts after she disinherited him a year before her death

Doreen Stock, 86, passed away childless in 2021 and left her whole estate to her nephew, Simon Stock (pictured), and his wife Catherine

With no kids of her own, Ms Stock's first will, made in 1986, left her estate to Mr Chiswick, boy of her niece Patricia Chiswick and spouse Brent.

The estate primarily consists of the Mottingham home, which is valued online at about ₤ 400,000.

The court heard Ms Stock had had a good relationship with the Chiswicks, who assisted her with her shopping and visited her frequently.

She even made an enduring power of attorney in their favour, but before she passed away withdrawed the file and changed her will, leaving whatever to a nephew on her spouse's side.

Challenging the will, Mr Chiswick declares that his great-aunt's dementia in her final years means there is major doubt whether she had the essential capability to make the modifications.

And he said the truth there was no conversation with his side of the family about the brand-new will recommended 'something not right' about her modification of mind.

'Doreen and I had an actually pleased relationship and she comprehended that leaving her estate to me would make an enormous difference to my life,' he said in his evidence.

For Simon and Catherine, barrister James McKean told the court that Ms Stock had actually likewise been close to Simon, who was 'the nearby thing to a son she had,' contributing to his school fees as a child.

And although she previously had a close relationship with Mr Chiswick's parents, that was destroyed when they recommended she go into a care home in 2019.

Patricia had actually then organized for a 'capacity evaluation' for her auntie, which the lawyer said caused Ms Stock fearing her self-reliance was being threatened and ultimately changing her will.

The estate primarily consists of the Mottingham house, which is valued online at about ₤ 400,000

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The court heard there had actually been 'structure resentment' with the method her power of lawyer was being administered, which 'lastly boiled over in the summer season of 2019 when the Chiswicks made an ill-judged - though perhaps well-intentioned - suggestion to Doreen that she invest a duration in domestic care.

'Doreen was, by all accounts, jealously independent. It is little wonder that she discovered the proposition to be worrying and offensive.

'No doubt Doreen was fretted about the possibility of entering into a home, then was asked to go through the capacity evaluation, and put 2 and two together.'

Within weeks of the evaluation, which resulted in a report stating she 'lacked capability,' she had begun steps to revoke the power of lawyer and make a new will in Simon and Catherine's favour, he informed the judge.

Quizzing Patricia Chiswick in the witness box, he added: 'Doreen liked her home and it had been her and Samuel's home before his death. There was a deep emotional connection to that residential or commercial property.

'Saying to Doreen that she should leave that residential or commercial property and spend some time in a care home was offensive to her, wasn't it?

'From Doreen's viewpoint, this need to have looked a genuine danger to her self-reliance.'

But Patricia rejected disturbing the pensioner, firmly insisting that the plan was only ever for a brief break in a care home while she and her other half went on vacation.

'It was simply a tip due to the fact that we do not normally disappear for three weeks at a time, and I believe she had actually been rather unhealthy and her health was degrading in basic,' she said.

'I was concerned about leaving her and I thought it would be rather great if she could go somewhere where she might be taken care of while we were away.

'It was absolutely stressed out that it was for three weeks. There was no tip she was going to stay there forever.'

The Chiswicks did not visit Ms Stock once again in between the capacity evaluation in 2019 and her death in May 2021.

For Patricia's boy Mr Chiswick, who is the plaintiff in the event, barrister Simon Lane said that, at the time she made the new will, she was 'vulnerable and was behaving out of character.'

The 2019 assessment performed after the tip of a care home relocation had actually led to a specialist's finding that she 'lacked capacity,' he stated.

But Mr McKean said the assessment wanted, with Ms Stock addressing with 'prickly hostility' when she was quizzed about things that made no sense to her, such as a fire which never actually occurred.

Other assessments around the same time had resulted in findings that she did have capacity, although she was suffering with 'mild' dementia,' he stated.

'Doreen may have had some memory issues, however capacity and memory are various monsters,' he stated.

'The court will struggle to discover any proof of impaired cognition or reasoning. On the contrary, Doreen's behaviour, values and reasoning were consistent and possible at all times.'

He stated there was factor for her to decide to change her will, the last being made more than thirty years formerly, and that by then Mr Chiswick - living and working on the other side of the Atlantic - would have been 'far from her mind as a beneficiary.'

He had actually not seen her again or perhaps spoken on the phone after transferring to the US, while the majority of the evidence of their relationship originated from when he was a child.

On the other hand, Mr Stock and his spouse had had the ability to visit her frequently, living not far from her in Eltham, south London, he said.

'The court can be shocked neither by the making of the contested will, nor by Doreen's option of recipients,' he included.

The judge is expected to offer her ruling on the case at a later date.