Court Opinion

ID: 9701077
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-25 22:03:37.087834+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T18:21:18.951298
License: Public Domain

On Rehearing. After the foregoing opinion was filed Hartford Accident & Indemnity Company moved that its liability for interest be limited to the period commencing August 19, 1959, the date of the probate court’s decree. This is a matter not previously argued by counsel or considered in the opinion.
*156Booth, Wadleigh, Langdell, Starr & Peters (Mr. Theodore Wadleigh orally), for Winthrop Wadleigh, succeeding trustee, and administrator d.b.n., w.w.a., opposed.
Wheeler, J.
The administrator contends that the surety for the conservator should be liable for interest from the dates when assets of the ward’s estate were wrongfully appropriated to the conservator’s own use. Knowlton v. Bradley, 17 N. H. 458; Society v. Pelham, 58 N. H. 566. Hartford contends that the shortages were due to “advances” reasonably made by the conservator to himself for compensation expectably due, and that no liability should attach for interest before the date of the probate decree. Wendell v. French, 19 N. H. 205; See Chagnon v. Insurance Co., 96 N. H. 256, 260.
We are of the opinion that the contention of the administrator is essentially correct. Miller v. Pender, 93 N. H. 1; Yeaton v. Skillings, 103 N. H. 352. However, the dates of appropriation by the conservator during the thirty-three-month period of the conservatorship cannot be fixed with any degree of certainty. Accordingly, the surety’s liability for interest in this case should be determined for the period commencing July 9, 1951, the date of death of the ward, by which date the total principal amount of the shortage had occurred. Consistently with the original opinion, the interest payable by Hartford should be compounded annually.

Former result affirmed.

All concurred.
June 29, 1962.