The High Court has refused an application by Albina Hoey to have her costs of unsuccessfully defending her removal as administratrix of her late husband’s estate paid from the estate.
Mr Justice David Keane delivered the ruling on 3 February 2017. The underlying action was brought by Deirdre Muckian and Mary McCann, who obtained an order removing Ms Hoey as administratrix in November 2016. The judgment identifies them and the other respondents as children of the marriage between Ms Hoey and the deceased. The other respondents did not participate.
Ms Hoey argued that the action was an administration suit and that an administratrix should generally receive her costs from the estate unless misconduct is established. The applicants opposed her request. They sought their own costs from the estate, an application Ms Hoey did not oppose; the court noted that they had not sought their costs against her personally.
The judge rejected the claim that an administratrix has an inflexible entitlement to costs from an estate unless a formal finding of misconduct is made. He said administrators may generally deserve costs from an estate when they litigate in good faith over a genuine issue in its administration. But litigation between beneficiaries may instead attract the usual rule that costs follow the outcome, depending on the circumstances.
In the earlier removal judgment, the court found an extraordinary and inadequately explained delay in administering the estate. It also found that Ms Hoey had failed to gather in estate property and properly account to beneficiaries for assets and liabilities. Those findings led to the conclusion that she lacked the proper capacity to carry out her duties as administratrix, warranting her removal.
Justice Keane said the action bore more of the hallmarks of a dispute between parties than of litigation responsibly pursued by an administratrix. He also relied on the finding that a draft distribution account produced in January 2016 raised questions and did not remedy the failure to account to beneficiaries for relevant income, expenditure and interest.
The court refused Ms Hoey’s request for her costs to be paid from the estate. It did not order that she pay the applicants’ costs personally; they had not asked for that relief.