Power v. Speckman

One of the sureties of the administratrix, who has been sued for her default, seeks to reverse the recovery against him upon two grounds. Fie claims that her appointment was void, and that she has not been required to account. The case shows that Mrs. Overbeck was supposed to have died intestate, and that her sister, Mrs. Burm ester, was the only next of kin entitled to administration; that she renounced, and the public administrator was appointed, and letters duly issued to him. He seems to have entered upon his duties, and out of a small fund which came to him, amounting to less than five hundred dollars, to have paid the funeral expenses. Nevertheless, about a year later, Mrs. Burmester presented a petition to the same surrogate for her own appointment as administratrix. It was duly verified and established all the jurisdictional facts necessary to validate the order which he made appointing her administratrix. The Code provides, after declaring the general jurisdiction of the Surrogate’s Court, that where its decree is drawn in question collaterally, and the necessary parties were duly cited or appeared, the jurisdiction is presumptively and, in the absence of fraud or collusion, conclusively established by the allegation of jurisdictional facts

But in her petition, Mrs. Burmester described the property of the intestate as amounting to twenty-eight hundred dollars, which was a very much larger sum than had gone into the hands of the public administrator, who had received it from her as being the whole estate, and his suspicions were thereby aroused. He filed a petition with the surrogate in which he alleged his own appointment and authority and the possession by Mrs. Burmester of the twenty-eight hundred dollars belonging to the intestate which she had described in her petition, and asked for a citation requiring her to show cause why she should not pay it over to him. He did not call her adminis

. . Then, and before any enforcement of the order, the affair took a new shape. A last will and testament of Mrs. Over-beck was discovered and admitted to probate, and letters testamentary issued to the present plaintiff. In such a case the Code provides (§ 2684) that the decree granting prohate shall revoke the former letters. The decree itself is not in the record, and we must assume obeyed the law and revoked the letters to the public administrator and to Mrs. Burmester, and each became at once liable to account to the executor for the funds of the estate. The Code further provides (§ 2596) that a person to whom letters are issued is liable for money in his hands or under his control when Ms letters were issued, in whatever capacity it was received. So that, even if Mrs. Burmester took the money as an individual, the moment letters were issued to her she held the fund as' administratrix. And the answer of Speckman admits that as administratrix she received into her possession certain funds and property of the estate.

The executor after his appointment obtained a decree from-the surrogate that said Gertrude Burmester be and she hereby is directed to pay to the said John Power, executor, the said sum of two thousand eight hundred dollars. By section 2605 of the Code the successor of an administrator whose letters have been, revoked may compel the latter to “ deliver over money or other property,” and is further authorized with the assent of the surrogate to prosecute the official bond.

It follows that since the appointment of Mrs. Burmester was

It is quite true that there are proceedings in aid of an executor or administrator which enable him by process of the surrogate and through his decree to recover from an individual money or property of the estate (Code, §§ 2706-2710); and that the petition of the public administrator, as also that of the executor and the two decrees of the surrogate contain nothing on their face to indicate how or in what eharater the party pi’oceeded against held the money, and so it is possible to argue that the decrees were against Mrs. Burmester only as an individual and not as administratrix, which result would discharge the sureties; but the facts established dissolve the ambiguity and show the true character of the decree. Had the proceeding against her been distinctively as an individual it could not have been maintained, for the recital in the petition of the public administrator of her petition for letters shows that the fact of her appointment appearing on the surrogate’s own records was drawn to his attention, and would have been a complete defense and required a dismissal of the proceeding. As we have seen, it stands admitted by the answer that she held the property of the estate as administratrix and that possession was lawful and could not be interfered with until some paramount right was shown; and that was established, first, by the prior right of the public administrator, and, second, hy the superior right of the executor. And so, wlrile it is difficult to understand liow.all the complications arose, or to approve the ambiguous form of the papers, yet we are not required to misinterpret them and quite enough appears to show that Mrs. Burmester was liable as administratrix, and that the decree against her was for the non-performance of official duty. All final decrees against an administrator which adjudge money of the estate

The judgment should be affirmed with costs.

All concur.

Judgment affirmed.