In re Blewitt — 45 N.Y. St. Rep. 829

Majority

p. 829

In the Matter of the Petition of Julia Blewitt for the Appointment of a Committee of the Person and Property of James Blewitt.

(Supreme Court, General Term, First Department,

Filed April 14, 1892.)

Headnote

Lunacy—Proceeding to vacate order.

Where the alleged lunatic refuses to submit himself to the jurisdiction of the court, he has no right to compel the continuance of proceedings instituted by him to vacate the order appointing a committee, and such proceedings will be dismissed.

Appeal from order dismissing all further proceedings under the petition of James Blewitt in the above lunacy proceedings. After the granting of an order for the appointment of a committee the alleged lunatic filed a petition asking that the order be vacated on the ground that he had had no notice of the proceedings. The application was denied, but he was allowed to traverse the allegations of the original petition, and a trial of the issue was directed. See 43 St. Bep., 926. The alleged lunatic, however, remained out of the state and refused to submit himself to the jurisdiction of the court.

p. 830

Isaac N. Miller, for James Blewitt, app’lt; Lorenzo Semple, for resp’t.

It appears from the papers presented upon this appeal that the petitioner, James Blewitt, refuses to submit himself to the jurisdiction of the court. If such refusal arises from his infirm condition of mind so as not to be responsible therefor, it necessarily follows that there is no necessity for the proceedings which were dismissed for the purpose of examining the question as to his restoration to sanity. If he is sane, then his refusal to submit himself to the jurisdiction of the court prevents his having any right to the equitable intervention of the court in the setting aside of the proceedings by which he was adjudged a lunatic.

It therefore necessarily follows that, whether sane or insane, James Blewitt had no right, under the circumstances presented by the papers upon this appeal, to compel the continuance of the proceedings which were dismissed.

The order appealed from should, therefore, be affirmed, with ten dollars costs and disbursements.

Yak Brunt, P. J., O’Brien and Andrews, JJ., concur.