Estate of Ford CA5

Filed 1/25/16 Estate of Ford CA5

NOT TO BE PUBLISHED IN THE OFFICIAL REPORTS California Rules of Court, rule 8.1115(a), prohibits courts and parties from citing or relying on opinions not certified for publication or ordered published, except as specified by rule 8.1115(b). This opinion has not been certified for publication or ordered published for purposes of rule 8.1115.

IN THE COURT OF APPEAL OF THE STATE OF CALIFORNIA FIFTH APPELLATE DISTRICT

Estate of EVELYN I. FORD, Deceased.

SUSAN FORD FRANTZICH, F070917

Petitioner and Appellant, (Super. Ct. No. 14CEPR00536)

v. OPINION CASEY S. ROGERS,

Objector and Respondent.

THE COURT* APPEAL from an order of the Superior Court of Fresno County. Robert H. Oliver, Judge. Garvey Schubert Barer, William J. Keeler, Jr. and Jennifer Fransen Gould, for Petitioner and Appellant. Chielpegian Law Offices, Mark E. Chielpegian and Lee S.W. Cobb, for Objector and Respondent. -ooOoo-

* Before Gomes, Acting P.J., Franson, J. and Peña, J.

Susan Ford Frantzich (Frantzich) appeals from an order of the probate court denying her petition for probate of a will of her mother, Evelyn I. Ford. On appeal, Frantzich claims the probate court erred by denying her petition without an evidentiary hearing. We affirm. FACTUAL AND PROCEDURAL BACKGROUND Frantzich is one of three children of Eugene M. and Evelyn I. Ford. Eugene died on April 25, 1993, while Evelyn died on December 23, 2013. On June 18, 2014,1 Frantzich filed a Petition for Probate of Will and for Letters Testamentary of Evelyn’s estate. Frantzich sought to admit to probate the following documents attached to the petition: Evelyn’s July 7, 2009 typewritten will, which appears to have been prepared by an attorney and signed by two witnesses (the will); typewritten First, Second and Third Codicils, dated October 28, 2009, May 10, 2012, and March 14, 2013, respectively, all of which appear to have been prepared by an attorney and signed by two witnesses (the codicils); and a March 6, 2013 handwritten codicil, purportedly signed by Evelyn and witnessed by her caretaker (the handwritten codicil). While Frantzich acknowledged that the Third Codicil named Evelyn’s grandson, Casey S. Rogers, as the executor, with the second nominee being James M. Bell and the third nominees being herself and her two sisters, she asked to be nominated as sole executor of the estate due to Rogers’s and Bell’s failure to act as executors. The probate court set a hearing on the petition for July 23. On July 11, Rogers filed a competing Petition for Probate of Will and for Letters Testamentary of Evelyn’s estate, in which he sought to admit into probate the will and codicils, but not the handwritten codicil. Rogers also sought to be appointed executor of