Estate of Johnston

Tinning & DeLap and Robert Eshleman, for Objector and Appellant.

Myron Siedorf, Milton D. Harris and R. Edgar Sanderson for Petitioner and Respondent.

OPINION

ELKINGTON, J.

The notice of appeal recites that it is from an "Order overruling objections to report of inheritance tax appraiser, fixing inheritance tax, and denying motion to approve report of the probate commissioner." We treat the appeal as from "an order fixing an inheritance tax," the remaining orders being nonappealable. (See Prob. Code, § 1240.)

Lois Card Crenshaw, executrix of the estate of Ethel Johnston, deceased, filed objections to the report of the inheritance tax appraiser. The only dispute concerned the taxability of a gift from the deceased to her niece, the executrix, Mrs. Crenshaw. By a minute order of the court the issue was submitted to Probate Commissioner Paul E. Springer. After a hearing the commissioner filed his report to the court with a recommendation that the objections to the report of the inheritance tax appraiser be sustained.

The court thereafter considered the evidence as reported by the commissioner. It found that the subject gift "was made in contemplation of the decedent's death,"…