Court case115 N.Y. 506 (1889)

A grandson who poisoned his grandfather to secure the estate left to him by will was held not entitled to take it, although the statute of wills contained no such exception, because the fundamental maxim that no one shall profit by his own wrong is part of the law.

Francis B. Palmer made a will leaving the bulk of his estate to his sixteen-year-old grandson, Elmer Palmer, with smaller gifts to his daughters, Mrs. Riggs and Mrs. Preston. Learning that his grandfather meant to change the will, Elmer poisoned him. He was convicted of murder in the second degree and imprisoned. The daughters then sued to have the bequest to Elmer annulled. The New York statutes governing wills said in plain words that a validly executed will must be given effect and made no exception for a beneficiary who murdered the testator.

The Court of Appeals, by Earl J., held that Elmer could not take. Statutes must be given a rational and equitable construction according to the intention of the legislature, which could never have intended to let a murderer inherit from his victim. Above all, "all laws as well as all contracts may be controlled in their operation and effect by general, fundamental maxims of the common law. No one shall be permitted to profit by his own fraud, or to take advantage of his own wrong, or to found any claim upon his own iniquity, or to acquire property by his own crime." Gray J. dissented: the statute was clear, the court was bound by it, and to deny Elmer the estate was to add a punishment the legislature had not enacted and to legislate from the bench.