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323 Mass. 671

Sullivan v. Sullivan

Massachusetts Supreme Judicial Court

Decided February 7, 1949

Massachusetts Supreme Judicial Court · decided 1949-02-07

Relies on Koutoudakis v. Great American Indemnity Co. · Ashley v. Collins

Good law ✅— No negative treatment on recordhow we know

Decided 1949-02-07

How this case has been cited

Cited by 7 later decisions — most recently November 1995

3 district · 4 state decisions

30194919501960197019801990decided

Later decisions citing this case, by decade. The current decade is in progress, and our corpus holds fewer opinions from the most recent years, so the latest bars are undercounted — not a real decline.

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Lummus, J.

¶1Martin J. Sullivan died as the result of personal injuries sustained in a collision, and an action was brought against Town Taxi and one Radzik for his conscious suffering and death. He had one son, Joseph Verner Sullivan. By his will he gave his son $1, and gave the residue of his estate to his brothers and sisters. The first and final account of the executors failed to account for $1,669.74 which had been recovered by the executors in an action of tort under G. L. (Ter. Ed.) c. 229, § 5, for the death of said Martin J. Sullivan and for the benefit of Joseph Verner Sullivan as next of kin. It appeared that Martin J. Sullivan was injured and died before December 13, 1941, so that this case is not affected by the changes in the death statute made by St. 1946, c. 614, which applied only to deaths occurring on or after January 1, 1947.

¶2' The account was allowed by the Probate Court, and Joseph Verner Sullivan appealed to this court. The case is governed by Koutoudakis v. Great American Indemnity Co. 285 Mass. 466, in which we said at pages 468 and 469, “Not infrequently an executor or administrator receives money which is not a part of the general assets of the estate, is not to be applied to the payment of debts, and is not to be distributed under the will or to the next of kin. In such cases . . . the Probate Court has jurisdiction to settle his account as to such money and to order its distribution.” Among the illustrations given are “claims for death under our own.statutes.” See also Ashley v. Collins, 292 Mass. 67, 71.

¶3Joseph Verner Sullivan as next of kin and statutory beneficiary of the death claim had a right to have the proceeds of that claim included in the account and distributed to him. He was plainly aggrieved by the decree allowing an account which omitted those proceeds.

¶4De~ee revers~d.

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