Priti Patel v Nicholas O’Sullivan and Others [2026] EWHC 801 (Ch): High Court upholds the July 2020 will and finds £35,000 loan outstanding

Introduction

In Patel v O’Sullivan & Others [2026] EWHC 801 (Ch), His Honour Judge Jarman KC, sitting as a judge of the High Court, rejected a daughter’s challenge to her mother’s July 2020 will and held that a separate £35,000 family loan remained outstanding. The proceedings combined a contentious probate claim with a CPR Part 64 application brought by the executor. The judgment addresses knowledge and approval, alleged testamentary undue influence, and the evidential significance of contemporaneous documents, solicitor attendance notes, and video recordings.

Factual background

Kantaben Ratilal Patel died in December 2020 at the age of 73. She was survived by her two children, Priti Patel and Sanjay Patel. The principal asset in her estate was the family home in De Burgh Street, Cardiff, where Priti Patel lived.

The family’s testamentary arrangements changed more than once. In 2019, after the death of Kantaben Patel’s husband, a later will divided her estate equally between her two children. In June 2020, however, a further will was made which was materially more favourable to Priti Patel. Under that will, the Cardiff home was left to her absolutely and she was appointed executrix.

By that stage, Kantaben Patel had been diagnosed with terminal cancer and was taking strong pain medication. The claimant’s case was that, by the time of the July 2020 will, her mother was physically and mentally weakened, vulnerable, and unable properly to understand what she was signing. She also alleged that Sanjay Patel and Vimlaben Patel, Kantaben Patel’s sister-in-law, had procured the change of will.

The defendants’ account was very different. They said that Kantaben Patel remained mentally alert, that she could walk and converse, and that she wanted to change the June 2020 will because it did not reflect her true wishes. Central to that account was a document signed by Kantaben Patel on 4 July 2020 while she was in a hospice. In that document she said that her daughter had become controlling, had pressured her into signing the June 2020 will, and had persuaded her to appoint her as attorney. She also referred to a £35,000 loan which she said needed to be addressed.

On 25 July 2020, Sanjay Patel collected his mother from Cardiff and took her to stay with relatives in Cowbridge until 30 July 2020. The claimant said that she had been taken there and kept there against her will in order to engineer a fresh will. Sanjay Patel and Vimlaben Patel said instead that Kantaben Patel herself wanted to leave Cardiff because of her daughter’s controlling conduct, including alleged restrictions on her use of the telephone.

The July 2020 will was prepared by solicitor Nicholas O’Sullivan, who was also named as executor. He took instructions from Kantaben Patel alone over the course of more than an hour, drafted the will, and later went through it with her before it was signed. Clause 3 dealt with the Cardiff property and with the alleged £35,000 loan. Clause 7 was a no-contest clause directed to challenges to the estate. Sanjay Patel accepted that he had paid for the will to be prepared.

The proceedings also involved a distinct but related dispute about the alleged loan. In an earlier claim, Nicholas O’Sullivan sought declaratory relief under CPR Part 64 in relation to Vimlaben Patel’s case that she had advanced £25,000 in 2018 and £10,000 in 2019 to Kantaben Patel for the benefit of Priti Patel, and that the sums had never been repaid. Those proceedings were consolidated with the probate claim.

There was also a notable body of contemporaneous material. Sanjay Patel produced video recordings of conversations with his mother on 25 July 2020 and 2 August 2020. Vimlaben Patel also produced two short recordings made in the car after the solicitor’s appointment. The recordings were in Gujarati, with some English, and translations were checked at trial. Priti Patel did not attend the hearing. She lacked litigation capacity, acted through a litigation friend, and her pleading and witness statement were admitted as hearsay.

The issues before the court

The first issue was whether Kantaben Patel knew and approved the contents of the July 2020 will. That required the court to consider her physical condition, the fact that English was not her first language, the short time between the June and July wills, and whether the more technical provisions of the later will were beyond her understanding.

The second issue was whether the July 2020 will had been procured by undue influence. The allegation was directed at Sanjay Patel and Vimlaben Patel. The question was whether coercion had been proved in the strict testamentary sense.

The third issue, arising under the Part 64 claim, was whether the alleged advances of £25,000 and £10,000 had in fact been made and, if so, whether they remained outstanding.

The court’s reasoning

The judge directed himself by reference to established authority. On knowledge and approval, he cited Gill v Woodall [2010] EWCA Civ 1430. On undue influence, he relied on the summary of principle in Edwards v Edwards [2007] EWHC 1119 (Ch).

As to knowledge and approval, the judge accepted Nicholas O’Sullivan’s evidence about the process by which instructions were taken and the will explained. He accepted that, although Kantaben Patel was in some pain, the pain did not impair her ability to understand the document she was signing. He also accepted the evidence that she could walk unaided, talk normally, and remain mentally alert. He further accepted that she had sufficient command of English to understand the will, notwithstanding that Gujarati was the family’s first language.

The judge did not, however, rest solely on the usual presumption arising from a duly executed solicitor-prepared will. Because the July 2020 will followed the June 2020 will within a matter of weeks, and because the June will was on its face explicable as a disposition favouring the daughter who lived in the property, he examined the evidence as a whole.

That broader examination led him to accept Nicholas O’Sullivan’s evidence that he had asked why Kantaben Patel wanted to change the June 2020 will so soon, and that she had replied that her daughter had told her to make it and that it did not reflect her wishes. The judge regarded that account as consistent with the evidence of Sanjay Patel and Vimlaben Patel, and with the 4 July 2020 hospice document.

The judge also attached significance to the evidence that Priti Patel had restricted her mother’s access to the telephone. He accepted evidence from other witnesses that phone contact had become difficult after the cancer diagnosis, and he concluded that it was likely that Priti Patel had become anxious about her position in the property, had persuaded her mother to make the June 2020 will, and had restricted communications because she feared that other family members might persuade her mother to change it.

The claimant also argued that the July 2020 will contained provisions too complex for Kantaben Patel to understand. The focus was on clause 3, which dealt with the home and the £35,000 loan, and clause 7, the no-contest provision. The judge rejected that argument. He accepted the attendance note showing that Nicholas O’Sullivan had explained clause 3 in practical terms, including giving Priti Patel a two-year period before sale and an opportunity to retain the house by paying the £35,000. He also accepted the explanation of clause 7 in straightforward terms, namely that a beneficiary who challenged the will risked losing any inheritance under it. The court sought reassurance about the legal position on such a clause and was referred to Nathan v Leonard [2002] EWHC 1701 (Ch).

The judge was not persuaded by two minor criticisms of the drafting process. One was that a questionnaire completed by Nicholas O’Sullivan recorded burial rather than cremation. The other was that Priti Patel’s year of birth was entered incorrectly. In the judge’s view, neither point materially undermined the reliability of the will-making process.

Nor did the unsigned oncology letter from 2024, expressing the view that Kantaben Patel would have been mentally unfit to sign legal documents between March and July 2020, carry substantial weight. No expert evidence had been permitted. More importantly, the opinion was inconsistent with the parties’ pleaded positions, including the claimant’s reliance on the June 2020 will. The judge held that Kantaben Patel did have capacity, although lack of testamentary capacity had not in fact been pleaded as a ground of challenge.

The video evidence supported that conclusion. Although one of the conversations with Sanjay Patel involved questions that were to some extent leading, the recordings overall showed Kantaben Patel speaking fluently, appearing alert, and making clear that she had acted as she wished and had not been forced.

On undue influence, the judge accepted that Sanjay Patel and Vimlaben Patel each had motive and opportunity. Sanjay Patel had collected his mother from Cardiff, had taken her to Cowbridge, and had paid for the will. Vimlaben Patel stood to receive £35,000 under the later will if the loan existed. But the judge held that the evidence fell short of coercion. Even if Sanjay Patel and Vimlaben Patel had sought to persuade Kantaben Patel to alter her will, the evidence did not show that her free judgment had been overborne. The more likely explanation, in the judge’s assessment, was that they were helping her to give effect to her actual wishes.

On the loan issue, the judge accepted Vimlaben Patel’s evidence. He held that her bank records showed the payment of £25,000 in 2018 and £10,000 in 2019, and he accepted the contemporaneous letters said to record those transactions. A suggestion in cross-examination that Kantaben Patel’s signatures on the letters were not genuine was rejected. The judge also accepted Vimlaben Patel’s explanation for receiving £17,750 from Kantaben Patel. That sum was not treated as part repayment of the loan. Instead, it was accepted as money intended principally for Yash Patel’s 21st birthday car and for other distributions after death. On that footing, the £35,000 remained outstanding. The judge regarded that finding as helping to explain why Kantaben Patel wanted to replace the June 2020 will, which had made no provision for the loan.

The decision

The court held that the July 2020 will was valid. The challenge based on want of knowledge and approval failed. The allegation of undue influence also failed.

The court further held that £35,000 remained outstanding from the estate to Vimlaben Patel.

The judge also rejected criticisms directed at Nicholas O’Sullivan for retaining the disputed £35,000 in client account and for the level of his ongoing fees. He held that it had been reasonable for the executor to preserve the sum pending resolution of the dispute and unsurprising that ongoing costs had been incurred while both the validity of the will and the loan issue remained live.

Further Reading

Wills, Estates and Inheritance Disputes
Contesting a Will – Will Dispute Solicitors
Parfitt v Jones [2025] EWHC 1552 (Ch): testamentary capacity
Solicitor Negligence in Will Writing & Estate Administration

Contact Us

Need advice on a will, estate or inheritance dispute? Speak to a specialist solicitor today. Call 0151 541 2040 or 0203 846 2862, email info@carruthers-law.co.uk, or contact Carruthers Law via the online enquiry form.