41 N.Y.S. 323 | N.Y. App. Div. | 1896
By the order appealed from in this matter, the surrogate directed the administratrix of the estate of James M. Comins, deceased, to tile an inventory of the personal property of the estate and that for failure so to do an attachment should issue. The order was made upon the petition of a person claiming to be the adopted daughter and only heir at law and next of kin of the intestate. The widow and certain of the next of kin opposed the petitioner’s application and denied that she maintained to the decedent the relation she claimed éxisted. The surrogate granted the application on the ground that, under the statute, he had no discretion to do otherwise, and this determination was reached upon the assumption that the only issue related to the sufficiency of an allegation that the applicant was the duly adopted daughter of the decedent. It is provided by section 2715 of the Code of Civil Procedure that an inventory must be filed by an administrator within three months from the date of the issuance of letters, and that, in default of such filing, a person interested in the estate, or a creditor, may apply, on proof of the fact, to the Surrogate’s Court, and if the surrogate be satisfied of the fact, he must require an inventory to he filed or cause to be shown why it should not be done. (Code Civ. Proc. § 2716.) It is also provided by section 2514 of the Code of Civil Procedure, subdivision 11, that a person interested may apply for an inventory, and that the allegation of his interest duly verified shall suffice, although his interest is disputed, unless he is excluded by some final determination from which no appeal is pending; and subdivision - 12 of the same section provides that the term next of kin shall include every one entitled under the provisions of law to share in the distribution of the distributable assets of the decedent, other than a surviving husband or wife. The decision of the surrogate-seems to be based upon a literal adherence to the-text of subdivision.
"We have no desire to limit in any way the meaning or operation of the subdivision of the section under consideration, but in this particular case we think the surrogate should not have required, upon this petition, without further proof, the filing of an inventory. That filing was not required by him of his own motion, but in recognition of a right which we think was not sufficiently established by the petitioner to justify the surrogate’s order.
The order appealed from should be reversed, with costs and disbursements, and the matter remitted to the surrogate for further consideration.
Van Brunt, P. J., Barrett, Rumsey and Williams, JJ., concurred.
Order reversed, with costs and disbursements, and the matter remitted to the surrogate for further consideration.