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In Hilderbran v. Tex. SW. Council, Inc., parties donated a ranch via a 1930 deed to trustees for the Boy Scouts. No. 04-22-00736-CV, 2024 Tex. App. LEXIS 4390 (Tex. App.—San Antonio June 26, 2024, no pet. history). In 1943, the then acting trustees deeded the ranch to a council. In 2022, successor trustees sued the council, alleging that the 1943 deed created a trust and that the council was the trustee. The successor trustees sought an accounting and other trust-related remedies. The trial court dismissed the suit, and the successor trustees appealed.
The court of appeals affirmed, holding that the 1943 deed did not create a trust:
“A trust may be created by . . . a property owner’s declaration that the owner holds the property as trustee for another person . . . .” “To create a trust by a written instrument, the beneficiary, the res, and the trust purpose must be identified.” But “[a] trust is created only if the settlor manifests an intention to create a trust.”
The Trustees argue the 1943 Deed creates an express trust because it designates a beneficiary, identifies the property, and describes the trust’s purpose. The beneficiaries are “several troops of Boy Scouts of America [in] the Southwest Texas Council.” The res is the “the 300 acres of land acquired under said conveyance, and all other properties subsequently acquired under said conveyance, and all other properties subsequently acquired in connection with and as part of such trust estate.” The trust’s purpose is to set aside property “for the use and benefit of the several troops of Boy Scouts of America which are now under the jurisdiction of the Southwest Texas Council, Boy Scouts of America.”
But by “a careful and detailed examination of the [1943 Deed] in its entirety,” it is apparent that these descriptions of the beneficiaries, the trust estate, and the trust purpose are references to the 1930 Deed’s trust language. These references, read in context of the entire 1943 Deed, do not create a separate trust, nor do the additional paragraphs: AND WHEREAS; NOW, THEREFORE; Object and Purpose; and Should the Said Council.
Id. Therefore, because there was no intent to create a separate trust via the 1943 deed, the court affirmed the dismissal of the trust-related claims because no trust existed.
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