Flanagan v. United States
United States Court of Appeals for the Tenth Circuit
810 F.2d 930 (1987)
- Written by Daniel Clark, JD
Facts
Before he died, Frank Parkes executed a document meant to create a revocable trust. Upon Parkes’s death, the trust was to use Parkes’s estate to make designated payments to designated individuals. With the assets that would remain, the trustee was instructed to support Parkes’s sister, Nellie Davis, and to use the assets for charitable purposes. When Parkes died, Davis and several other of his heirs challenged the validity of the trust in state court and sued to have Parkes’s estate distributed according to the state intestacy statute. The court, balancing the heirs’ statutory rights and Parkes’s charitable intention, ordered a settlement under which approximately $350,000 of Parkes’s estate went to a charitable organization, with Parkes’s heirs receiving the rest. The administrator of Parkes’s estate (plaintiff) claimed a charitable deduction for the $350,000, which the Internal Revenue Service (IRS) (defendant) disallowed. The administrator paid the disputed tax and sued the IRS in district court for a refund. The district court ruled in favor of the IRS, and the administrator appealed.
Rule of Law
Issue
Holding and Reasoning (Logan, J.)
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