Psychological abuse

A parent made a will and decided to disinherit two of their children alleging psychological abuse, specifically for "contempt" and "abandonment", especially since the mother's divorce and during a period when he was seriously ill.

The issue is that the family relationship had been very deteriorated for years. After the divorce, the children were minors and a very limited visitation schedule was established. Furthermore, cohabitation and family interactions took place in an atmosphere of conflict , with incidents and confrontations, and with the image of a distant father who was not very involved in the relationship with his children.

The children challenged the will and requested that the disinheritance be declared null , saying that the lack of relationship was not solely their fault, as it was conditioned by the previous family conflict ; they also claimed that later they tried to reconcile . Initially, the court ruled in their favor, declaring the disinheritance unfair and acknowledged their legitimate share . However, on appeal , it was overturned and the annulment was dismissed.

Finally, the Supreme Court (SC) annulled the appellate court's decision and confirmed the initial ruling. It clarified that in order to disinherit for psychological abuse (understood within the "abuse of rights" of the CC art. 853.2 with a teleological interpretation) two requirements are needed:

- that the abuse is attributable to the heir , and

- that the testator has suffered real emotional harm .

Making it clear that not all distancing, cooling of the bond, or prolonged separation serves alone as a cause for disinheritance . The Supreme Court gave great importance to the family context (custody and predominant role of the mother, reduced visits and lack of initiative from the father to rebuild the bond) and also to the sequence of wills

The Supreme Court gave great importance to family context (custody and predominant role of the mother, limited visits, and lack of father's initiative to rebuild the bond) and also to the sequence of wills . The father had made two previous leaving the children as heirs and only in the last one, already sick, introduced the disinheritance. Therefore, it is not enough to prove that the broken relationship whether the children paid little attention to the sick father, the decisive factor is whether the distance can be attributed exclusively to the children. If the lack of relationship mainly comes from the divorce conflict and a bad dynamic since childhood, it cannot be assumed that the required psychological abuse exists to disinherit.

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