Howard v. Hunt

• Decision Date: 28 May 1929
• Court: United States State Supreme Judicial Court of Massachusetts Supreme Court
• Parties: JOHN K. HOWARD & others, executors, & another v. EDGAR N. HUNT.

267 Mass. 185

JOHN K. HOWARD & others, executors, & another v. EDGAR N. HUNT.

Supreme Judicial Court of Massachusetts, Middlesex.

May 28, 1929

January 17, 1929.

Present: RUGG, C.

J., CROSBY CARROLL, & SANDERSON, JJ.

Trust, Compensation of trustee.

One of three trustees appointed under a will insisted that he was to manage the trust and claimed three fifths or the trustees' compensation as managing trustee. The second trustee, who was competent and willing to perform his full share of the trustees' duties, thereafter for seven years performed practically no service for the trust. At the hearing in a probate court of petitions for the allowance of accounts by the first and third trustees for those years which contained an allowance of three fifths of the entire compensation to the first trustee and one fifth to each of the others, the judge found that the entire compensation was reasonable, ruled that the second trustee and the third trustee each was entitled to one third of the compensation and ordered the entry of a decree directing the first trustee to pay certain sums to them accordingly. Upon appeal, it was held, that

(1) Although the first trustee could not arbitrarily prevent the second trustee from performing his part of the work and decide the compensation to be paid to each trustee, the second trustee having failed to seek his remedy promptly in the Probate Court and having done practically none of the work for the period in question, was not as a matter of law entitled to one third of the compensation;

(2) Each trustee was entitled only to reasonable compensation according to services actually rendered, to be determined by the

Probate Court; (3) The decree was reversed, and the case remanded to the Probate

Court for a determination of what was a reasonable compensation to be allowed each of the trustees according to his services, excess allowances, if any, to be ordered returned to the trust estate.

PETITIONS, filed in the Probate Court for the county of Middlesex for the allowance of certain accounts of two of the three trustees under the will of Frank E. Simpson, late of Framingham.

The petitions were heard by Campbell, J., a stenographer having been appointed under G.L.c. 215, Section 18. The judge found that Hunt was ready, able and willing to perform services in connection with the several trusts, but that he was prevented from so doing by Gaston. Other material facts found by the judge and a decree entered by his order are described in the opinion. The petitioners appealed.

T. Hunt, (W.

T.Snow with him,) for the petitioners.

F.L. Norton, (Arthur P. French with him,) for the respondent.

CARROLL, J. These are appeals by the executors of the will of William A. Gaston and by Frederic E. Snow from decrees of the Probate Court disallowing certain items of the accounts filed by Gaston and Snow, trustees under the will of Frank E. Simpson, and ordering that the sums designated be paid from the estate of Gaston to Snow and to Edgar N. Hunt.

Frank E. Simpson by his will named Gaston, Hunt, and one other person, for whom Snow was substituted, as trustees of the trusts described. Hunt for several years had been the confidential secretary of Simpson and was familiar with his investments. In 1918 according to the findings of the judge, Gaston informed Hunt that as managing trustee he was entitled to three fifths of the entire compensation to be allowed the trustees and that Snow and Hunt should each receive one fifth. Hunt objected to this, contending that he was able, ready and willing to perform at least one third of the trustees' duties. From this time Hunt performed very little service for the trust. He made no investment, paid no income "and, in fact, did nothing except go to Gaston's office where the trusts were managed to examine the accounts of Gaston and Snow." The accounts here in issue end on December 31, 1925. Gaston's executors contend they should receive three fifths of the entire charge for the services of the trustees. It is not disputed that the total charge is reasonable. It was found that Hunt was fully capable of managing the trusts. The judge ruled he was entitled to one third of the entire compensation to be paid the trustees.

Hunt was named by the testator Simpson as one of his trustees. His responsibilities were equal with those of his...