In the Matter of the Petition of Constant A. Andrews, Respondent, to Restore Blanche L. Andrews to Her Liberty and Property, and to Supersede the Commission de Lunatico Inquirendo, Wherein the Said Blanche L. Andrews Was Adjudged Insane. Nannie V. Roosevelt and John E. Roosevelt, Appellants.
Second Department,
December 30, 1908.
Incompetent persons — practice —inquiry into present mental condition —venue.
An application to the Supreme Court to inquire into the present mental condition of one judicially declared incompetent mustbemadein the judicial district where the incompetent resided at the time she was adjudged insane.
Such motion should be made in the original proceeding, and not entitled as a new proceeding.
Appeal by Mannie Y. Boosevelt and another from an order of the Supreme Court, made at the Bockland Special Term and entered in the office of the clerk of the county of Westchester on the 27th day of October, 1908, directing an inquiry into the present mental condition of Blanche L. Andrews, granted on the motion of her husband.
Blanche L. Andrews was found upon due inquisition in 1903 to be a lunatic, and committees of her person and her property were appointed by the Supreme Court in Mew York county, the place of her residence with her husband.
John F. Devlin [George O. Kobbé and Grant Notman with him on the brief], for the appellants.
William M. Seabury [Charles Stewart Butler with him on the brief], for the respondent.
[MAJORITY — Gaynor, J.:]
Gaynor, J.:
This application should have been made in the county of Mew York, and the court should have refused to hear it in the county of Bockland. A proceeding to have a person declared a lunatic, and his property and person put in the charge of a committee, has to be had in the judicial district in which such person resides, as is prescribed by section 2323 of the Code of Civil Procedure. Section 2343 provides that when the lunatic becomes competent again, the court must discharge the committee of his person and property, and restore his property to him. It does not specifically say the application therefor must be in such place of his residence, but that follows plainly enough from reading the whole title on the subject (§§ 2320-2344); and the matter is settled by judicial decision. Also, the motion should be in the original proceeding, and not in a newly entitled proceeding, as here (Matter of Porter, 34 App. Div. 147; Matter of Osborn, 74 id. 113; Matter of Bischoff, 80 id. 326). The order should be reversed and the proceeding dismissed.
Woodward, Jerks, Hooker and Miller, JJ., concurred.
Order reversed, with ten dollars costs and disbursements, and proceeding dismissed.