Senate Bill No. 687
(By Senators White and Buckalew)
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[Introduced February 23, 1998; referred to the
Committee on the Judiciary.]
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A BILL to amend and reenact section eight, article one, chapter
forty-one of the code of West Virginia, one thousand nine
hundred thirty-one, as amended, relating to wills and
codicils to wills; and providing that a photocopy of a lost,
but not revoked, will or codicil, is valid when properly
verified.
Be it enacted by the Legislature of West Virginia:
That section eight, article one, chapter forty-one of the
code of West Virginia, one thousand nine hundred thirty-one, as
amended, be amended and reenacted to read as follows:
ARTICLE 1. CAPACITY TO MAKE; REQUISITES; VALIDITY.
§41-1-8. Revival after revocation.
No will or codicil, or any part thereof, which shall be in
any manner revoked, shall, after being revoked, be revived otherwise than by the re-execution thereof, or by a codicil
executed in the manner hereinbefore required, and then only to
the extent to which an intention to re-revive the same is shown:
Provided, That a photocopy of a will that has been lost without
the intent of the testator to revoke the same, shall be valid as
and for the original upon affidavit of one or more of the
subscribing witnesses to said will, stating that said copy is
identical in all respects to its original, that said original was
duly executed by the testator or testatrix when he or she was
over eighteen years of age and of sound mind and memory, by whom
the will was witnessed, and that the same was attested in the
manner required by law.
NOTE: The purpose of this bill is to allow photocopies of
lost wills or codicils to be verified and used in place of the
original, where the original has been inadvertently lost without
an intent to revoke it.
Strike-throughs indicate language that would be stricken
from the present law, and underscoring indicates new language
that would be added.