Middleby's Estate

Citations

• 242 Pa. 39
• 88 A. 773
• 1913 Pa. LEXIS 834

Syllabus

<p>Decedents’ estates — Executors—Mismanagement—Discharge — Evidence — Depositions—Party within jurisdiction — Depositions of a respondent — Court records.</p> <p>1. A resident and a nonresident were appointed ancillary executors of a decedent’s estate, and in accordance with the directions of the will were to operate the business left by the testator. The resident executor did not participate in the management thereof, and the nonresident executor appointed as his agent therefor a third person whose conduct was detrimental to the interests of the estate, and who was restrained at the instance of the resident executor, by injunction, from wasting its assets. Thereafter the resident executor petitioned for the removal of the nonresident executor, alleging that he was mismanaging the estate. Held, that the court was correct in removing such executor, where a finding that he had neglected to perform his duties, had grossly mismanaged the estate to its great injury, and had refused to appear before the court to explain his conduct, when directed so to do, was justified by the evidence.</p> <p>2. In such a case, the record of injunction proceedings brought by the resident executor against the manager for the purposes of preventing the wasting of the assets is admissible in evidence, where it appears that the nonresident executor had in a letter to his attorney referred to said manager as his agent.</p> <p>3. A motion by such nonresident executor for the appointment of a commission to take his depositions was properly denied, as he was a party to the record, and for the purposes of the estate, within the jurisdiction of the court.</p>