Thiel Detective Service Co. v. McClure

Citations

• 130 F. 55
• 1904 U.S. App. LEXIS 4792

Syllabus

<p>1. Federal Courts — Equity Jurisdiction — Action against Executors.</p> <p>An unsecured creditor of a deceased person having a mere legal demand which has not been reduced to judgment is not a cestui que trust in such a sense as to be entitled, in the absence of fraud, gross wrong, or unreasonable delay on the part of the decedent’s executor, to maintain a bill in equity in the federal circuit court against such executor to compel an accounting.</p> <p>2. Same — Decedents’ Estates — Settlement.</p> <p>Federal courts have no original jurisdiction in respect to the administration and general settlement of the estates of deceased persons.</p> <p>3. Same — Suits at Law.</p> <p>Though a creditor of a deceased person may establish the validity of his claim by a suit at law in the federal courts, provided requisite jurisdictional elements are present, yet on recovering judgment, if the same is not paid, the creditor must ordinarily seek relief by a marshaling of assets in the state courts having jurisdiction of the settlement of estates.</p> <p>4. Same — Conflicting Jurisdiction.</p> <p>Where, at the time a creditor of a deceased person filed a bill in equity in the federal court to compel an accounting by the executor, a suit in equity had already been begun in the state court under a state statute for a similar purpose, to which complainant was not made a party, the state court haying first assumed jurisdiction, complainant’s bill was not maintainable.</p> <p>f 4. Conflict of jurisdiction with state courts, Louisville Trust Co. v. City of Cincinnati, 22 C. C. A. 356.</p>