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MAKING A KILLING IN REAL ESTATE: SOLVING THE MYSTERY OF MURDER'S EFFECT ON TENANCY BY THE ENTIRETY IN NEW YORK-A LEGISLATIVE SOLUTION

INTRODUCTION

In 1889, sixteen-year-old Elmer E. Palmer murdered his grandfather to secure his inheritance. Fearing that his grandfather's lavish bequest to him would be revoked, Elmer killed his grandfather with poison.1 Elmer never received his inheritance, however, because the New York Court of Appeals held that by reason of his crime, he had surrendered any interest he may have had in his grandfather's estate.2

Since Riggs v. Palmer, New York courts have insisted that "[n]o one shall be permitted to ... take advantage of his own wrong, or to ... acquire property by his own crime."3 In spite of its precedential value and stature as a founding case in the effect of murder on property, ...

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