McKechnie v. City of Springfield

41 N.E.2d 557, 311 Mass. 406, 142 A.L.R. 257, 1942 Mass. LEXIS 719
CourtMassachusetts Supreme Judicial Court
DecidedApril 6, 1942
StatusPublished
Cited by5 cases

This text of 41 N.E.2d 557 (McKechnie v. City of Springfield) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering Massachusetts Supreme Judicial Court primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
McKechnie v. City of Springfield, 41 N.E.2d 557, 311 Mass. 406, 142 A.L.R. 257, 1942 Mass. LEXIS 719 (Mass. 1942).

Opinion

Dolan, J.

This is an appeal from a decree entered in the Probate Court allowing, with certain modifications, the twenty-ninth account of the trustees under the will of Edward M. Walker, late of Springfield, deceased.

The case was heard by the judge upon a case stated which disclosed the following facts: The testator died testate on October 2, 1905. Under the terms of his will, which was duly admitted to probate, he gave the residue of his estate in trust to pay the net income to his brother, William B. Walker, at such times as he might desire during his natural life, and after his death to pay the net income to the testator’s cousin, Katherine E. Richardson, on the same terms, and after her death to pay one third of the net income annually to the Springfield Hospital for charitable uses, one third annually to the City Library Association for certain charitable uses, and one third annually to the city of Springfield to be used for the extension, development and ornamentation of Forest Park in that city, under the direction of the board of park commissioners.

William B. Walker died on June 23, 1911, and Katherine E. Richardson died on April 4, 1939. Among the assets of the trust on April 1, 1934, was a participation in a promissory note of Urbano Giuliani. The note was for $4,800, bore interest at five and one half per cent per annum, payable quarterly, and was secured by a mortgage of certain real estate located in Springfield. The interest of the trust in the note was $4,037.76. No interest was paid thereon after April 1, 1934, and the mortgage was foreclosed on April 5, 1935, and thereafter the trustees had a fractional interest in the real estate itself.

The real estate was sold on May 17, 1939, for $3,400 and the accountants received a participation of $2,566.45 in a new mortgage note (covering the same premises) and $342.21 in cash. After deducting the proportionate amount of the expenses of foreclosure and crediting the proportionate amount of receipts from the operation of the real estate, the net proceeds of the sale received by the accountants were $1,945.66.

In the account as filed the accountants credited $9.13 to [408]*408income as an apportionment between principal and income, being for the period from April 4, 1939, the date of death of Katherine E. Richardson, to May 17, 1939, the date of the sale, and paid that sum in equal shares to the present beneficiaries. “An apportionment of said net proceeds for the period from April 1, 1934, to May 17, 1939, in accordance with the formula adopted in the case of Springfield Safe Deposit & Trust Co. v. Wade, 305 Mass. 36, would result in the sum of $1,614.45 being allocated to principal and the sum of $331.21 being allocated to income. An apportionment of . . . [the latter sum] between the period from April 1, 1934, to April 4, 1939, and the period from April 4, 1939, to May 17, 1939, would result in the sum of $323.60 being allocated to the prior period and $7.61 to the latter period. If the cash received on said sale is first to be applied to reimburse the principal of the trust for said expenses of foreclosure and maintenance, in order to pay the estate of the deceased life . . . [beneficiary] said sum of $323.60 it will be necessary either to use other principal cash or to assign to her estate an interest in said new note and mortgage.”

An examination of the account, which is set forth in the record, discloses that among the investments of the trust are many notes secured by mortgages of real estate or by participations therein, and that in some instances the mortgages have been foreclosed and the interest of the trusts reduced to interests in the real estate itself. A “Real Estate Memorandum” set forth in the account shows foreclosed real estate or interests therein held by the trust (six parcels) at a total value of $132,561.38. The principal of the trust estate is carried in schedule C of the account at a value (as amended) of $699,329.46. The account before us covers the period from November 29, 1939, to April 15, 1940. The income from the trust estate during that period was approximately $12,000.

The parties set forth in a stipulation the changes required to be made in the schedules of the account if there should be an apportionment of the proceeds of the sale of the real estate between the estate of Katherine E. Richardson and [409]*409the present beneficiaries. The judge thereafter entered a decree directing that those changes be made and allowed the account as thus modified, with the result that the accountants were charged in schedule E with an additional amount of income, less commissions, of $300.95, payable to the estate of Katherine E. Richardson by way of an apportionment of the proceeds of the sale of the real estate involved. The respondent city of Springfield appealed from the decree and now urges that the estate of Miss Richardson is not entitled to any part of the proceeds of the sale.

In support of its position the respondent city argues, upon the authority of Ogden v. Allen, 225 Mass. 595, that since the real estate in question was not sold during the lifetime of Miss Richardson an apportionment should not be made, and further contends that sound administration does not permit of such action in a case such as this, where the trust now runs in perpetuity and a long period of time may elapse before other unproductive real estate acquired by foreclosure in the lifetime of Katherine E. Richardson, and which is still held by the trust, may be disposed of under existing conditions, possibly for more than twenty years, with the result that the life beneficiary’s estate would have to be kept open indefinitely, and the interests of the present beneficiaries would be undetermined over a corresponding period of time. On the other hand, the executor of the will of Miss Richardson argues in substance that the case of Ogden v. Allen, 225 Mass. 595 (to which we have already referred), should not control the present case, and that to allow the apportionment in accordance with the decree entered by the judge is a logical development of Springfield Safe Deposit & Trust Co. v. Wade, 305 Mass. 36, and in accord with the view taken by judicial decisions in other jurisdictions and that taken by other authorities in the field.

The first "question that arises is whether an apportionment of the proceeds of the sale in question should be made since the sale was made after the death of Miss Richardson. In Ogden v. Allen, 225 Mass. 595, the real estate involved, together with other properties, was devised in trust by the [410]*410will of the testator. It was unproductive when he died, as were other parcels so devised by him, and continued to be unproductive up to the time of its sale after the death of the life beneficiary. The income from the trust estate had not at any time during her life equalled the amount of income to which she was entitled during her life. During her lifetime sales of other unproductive real estate had been made and the proceeds apportioned between principal and income. As to the parcel sold after her death the court held that an apportionment ought not to be made, since the fund did not come into existence until after the death of the life beneficiary, and until all her rights under the trust had ceased, and that at “the time when the fund was created, she had no beneficial interest in the trust.”

It is to be observed that the Ogden case is distinguishable from Springfield Safe Deposit & Trust Co. v. Wade, 305 Mass.

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Bluebook (online)
41 N.E.2d 557, 311 Mass. 406, 142 A.L.R. 257, 1942 Mass. LEXIS 719, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/mckechnie-v-city-of-springfield-mass-1942.