PART 2. 
DEFINITIONS



 



§560:1-201  General definitions. 
Subject to additional definitions contained in the subsequent articles that are
applicable to specific articles, parts, or sections, and unless the context
otherwise requires, in this chapter:



"Agent" includes an attorney-in-fact
under a durable or nondurable power of attorney, an individual authorized to
make decisions concerning another's health care, and an individual authorized
to make decisions for another under a natural death act.



"Application" means a written request
to the registrar for an order of informal probate or appointment under part 3
of article III.



"Beneficiary", as it relates to a
trust beneficiary, includes a person who has any present or future interest,
vested or contingent, and also includes the owner of an interest by assignment
or other transfer; as it relates to a charitable trust, includes any person
entitled to enforce the trust; as it relates to a "beneficiary of a
beneficiary designation", refers to a beneficiary of an insurance or
annuity policy, of an account with POD designation, of a security registered in
beneficiary form (TOD), or of a pension, profit-sharing, retirement, or similar
benefit plan, or other nonprobate transfer at death; and, as it relates to a "beneficiary
designated in a governing instrument", includes a grantee of a deed, a
devisee, a trust beneficiary, a beneficiary of a beneficiary designation, a
donee, appointee, or taker in default of a power of appointment, or a person in
whose favor a power of attorney or a power held in any individual, fiduciary,
or representative capacity is exercised.



"Beneficiary designation" refers to a
governing instrument naming a beneficiary of an insurance or annuity policy, of
an account with POD designation, of a security registered in beneficiary form
(TOD), or of a pension, profit-sharing, retirement, or similar benefit plan, or
other nonprobate transfer at death.



"Child" includes an individual
entitled to take as a child under this chapter by intestate succession from the
parent whose relationship is involved and excludes a person who is only a
stepchild, a foster child, a grandchild, or any more remote descendant.



"Claims", in respect to estates of
decedents and protected persons, includes liabilities of the decedent or
protected person, whether arising in contract, in tort, or otherwise, and
liabilities of the estate which arise at or after the death of the decedent or
after the appointment of a conservator, including funeral expenses and expenses
of administration.  The term does not include estate or inheritance taxes, or
demands or disputes regarding title of a decedent or protected  person to
specific assets alleged to be included in the estate.



"Court" means the circuit court in
this State having jurisdiction in matters relating to the affairs of decedents.



"Conservator" shall have the meaning
provided in section 560:5-102.



"Descendant" of an individual means
all of the individual's descendants of all generations, with the relationship
of parent and child at each generation being determined by the definition of
child and parent contained in this chapter.



"Devise", when used as a noun, means
a testamentary disposition of real or personal property and, when used as a
verb, means to dispose of real or personal property by will.



"Devisee" means a person designated
in a will to receive a devise.  For the purposes of article II, in the case of
a devise to an existing trust or trustee, or to a trustee on trust described by
will, the trust or trustee is the devisee and the beneficiaries are not
devisees.



"Distributee" means any person who
has received property of a decedent from the decedent's personal representative
other than as a creditor or purchaser.  A testamentary trustee is a distributee
only to the extent of distributed assets or increment thereto remaining in the
trustee's hands.  A beneficiary of a testamentary trust to whom the trustee has
distributed property received from a personal representative is a distributee
of the personal representative.  For the purposes of this provision,
"testamentary trustee" includes a trustee to whom assets are
transferred by will, to the extent of the devised assets.



"Estate" includes the property of the
decedent, trust, or other person whose affairs are subject to this chapter as
originally constituted and as it exists from time to time during
administration.



"Exempt property" means that property
of a decedent's estate which is described in section 560:2-403.



"Fiduciary" includes a personal
representative, guardian, conservator, and trustee.



"Foreign personal representative"
means a personal representative appointed by another jurisdiction.



"Formal proceedings" means
proceedings conducted before a judge with notice to interested persons.



"Governing instrument" means a deed,
will, trust, insurance or annuity policy, account with POD designation,
security registered in beneficiary form (TOD), pension, profit-sharing,
retirement, or similar benefit plan, instrument creating or exercising a power
of appointment or a power of attorney, or a dispositive, appointive, or
nominative instrument of any similar type.



"Guardian" shall have the meaning
provided in section 560:5-102.



"Heirs", except as controlled by
section 560:2-711, means persons, including the surviving spouse or reciprocal
beneficiary and the State, who are entitled under the statutes of intestate
succession to the property of a decedent.



"Incapacitated person" shall have the
meaning provided in section 560:5-102.



"Informal proceedings" means those
conducted without notice to interested persons by an officer of the court
acting as a registrar for probate of a will or appointment of a personal
representative.



"Interested person" includes heirs,
devisees, children,  spouses or reciprocal beneficiaries, creditors,
beneficiaries, and any others having a property right in or claim against a
trust estate or the estate of a decedent, ward, or protected person.  It also
includes persons having priority for appointment as personal representative,
and other fiduciaries representing interested persons.  The meaning as it
relates to particular persons may vary from time to time and must be determined
according to the particular purposes of, and matter involved in, any
proceeding.



"Issue" of a person means descendant
as defined in this section.



"Joint tenants with the right of
survivorship" and "community property with the right of
survivorship" includes tenancies by the entirety and co-ownership of
property held under circumstances that entitle one or more owners to the whole
of the property on the death of the other or others, but excludes forms of
co-ownership registration in which the underlying ownership of each party is in
proportion to that party's contribution.



"Lease" includes an oil, gas, or
other mineral lease.



"Letters" includes letters
testamentary, letters of  guardianship, letters of administration, and letters
of conservatorship.  Unless otherwise provided by order of the court or
registrar, letters testamentary and letters of administration shall only be effective
for three years unless renewed for good cause, and such limitation shall be
stated on the face of the letters.



"Minor" shall have the meaning
provided in section 560:5-102.



"Mortgage" means any conveyance,
agreement, or arrangement in which property is encumbered or used as security.



"Nonresident decedent" means a
decedent who was domiciled in another jurisdiction at the time of decedent's
death.



"Organization" means a corporation,
business trust, estate, trust, partnership, joint venture, association,
government or governmental subdivision or agency, or any other legal or
commercial entity.



"Parent" includes any person entitled
to take, or who would be entitled to take if the child died without a will, as
a parent under this chapter by intestate succession from the child whose
relationship is in question and excludes any person who is only a stepparent,
foster parent, or grandparent.



"Payor" means a trustee, insurer,
business entity, employer, government, governmental agency or subdivision, or
any other person authorized or obligated by law or a governing instrument to
make payments.



"Person" means an individual or an
organization.



"Personal representative" includes
executor, administrator, successor personal representative, special administrator,
and persons who perform substantially the same function under the law governing
their status.  "General personal representative" excludes special
administrator.



"Petition" means a written request to
the court for an order after notice.



"Proceeding" includes action at law
and suit in equity. "Property" includes both real and
personal property or any interest therein and means anything that may be the
subject of ownership.



"Protected person" shall have the
meaning provided in section 560:5-102.



"Protective proceeding" means a
proceeding held pursuant to part 4 of article V.



"Registrar" refers to the official of
the court designated to perform the functions of registrar as provided in
section 560:1-307.



"Security" includes any note, stock,
treasury stock, bond, debenture, evidence of indebtedness, certificate of
interest or participation in an oil, gas, or mining title or lease or in
payments out of production under such a title or lease, collateral trust
certificate, transferable share, voting trust certificate or, in general, any
interest or instrument commonly known as a security, or any certificate of
interest or participation, any temporary or interim certificate, receipt, or
certificate of deposit for, or any warrant or right to subscribe to or
purchase, any of the foregoing.



"Settlement", in reference to a
decedent's estate, includes the full process of administration, distribution,
and closing.



"Special administrator" means a
personal representative as described by sections 560:3-614 through 560:3-618.



"State" means a state of the United States, the District of Columbia, the Commonwealth of Puerto Rico, or any territory or
insular possession subject to the jurisdiction of the United States.



"Successor personal representative"
means a personal representative, other than a special administrator, who is
appointed to succeed a previously appointed personal representative.



"Successors" means persons, other
than creditors, who are entitled to property of a decedent under the decedent's
will or this chapter.



"Supervised administration" refers to
the proceedings  described in article III, part 5.



"Survive" means that an individual
has neither predeceased an event, including the death of another  individual,
nor is deemed to have predeceased an event under section 560:2-104 or
560:2-702.  The term includes its derivatives, such as "survives",
"survived", "survivor", "surviving".



"Testacy proceeding" means a
proceeding to establish a will or determine intestacy.



"Testator" includes an individual of
either sex.



"Trust" includes an express trust,
private or charitable, with additions thereto, wherever and however created. 
The term also includes a trust created or determined by judgment or decree
under which the trust is to be administered in the manner of an express trust. 
The term excludes other constructive trusts and excludes resulting trusts,
conservatorships, personal representatives, trust accounts as defined in
article VI, custodial arrangements pursuant to chapters 553A and 554B, business
trusts providing for certificates to be issued to beneficiaries, common trust
funds, voting trusts, security arrangements, liquidation trusts, and trusts for
the primary purpose of paying debts, dividends, interest, salaries, wages,
profits, pensions, or employee benefits of any kind, and any arrangement under
which a person is nominee or escrowee for another.



"Trustee" includes an original,
additional, or successor trustee, whether or not appointed or confirmed by
court.



"Ward" shall have the meaning
provided in section 560:5-102.



"Will" includes codicil and any
testamentary instrument that merely appoints an executor, revokes or revises
another will, nominates a guardian, or expressly excludes or limits the right
of an individual or class to succeed to property of the decedent passing by
intestate succession. [L 1996, c 288, pt of §1; am L 1997, c 383, §19; am L
2004, c 161, §25]



 



Case Notes



 



  Appellant was not an "interested person", as
defined in this section, who could petition the court under §560:3-614 for
appointment as special administrator where appellant had no familial
relationship to decedent's family, did not have a property right or claim
against decedent's estate, and did not have priority under §560:3-203 to be
appointed as personal representative of decedent's estate; circuit court thus
properly denied appellant's petition.  88 H. 148, 963 P.2d 1124.



  The term "interested person" as defined in this
section does not include a party interested solely in challenging a closure
order in a probate proceeding; where appellants did not "possess an
interest in the estate itself" nor were trustees, heirs, devisees,
children, spouses or reciprocal beneficiaries, creditors, or beneficiaries,
trial court correctly denied appellant media's petition to intervene as
"interested persons".  106 H. 453, 106 P.3d 1096.



  Current income beneficiary of trust lacked standing to
participate in matter concerning the distribution of the corpus upon
termination of the trust where income beneficiary did not have any interest in
the estate that would be affected by the particular probate proceeding inasmuch
as income beneficiary was merely a measuring life and not a residuary
beneficiary, and income beneficiary's interest was not a property right in or
claim against the estate.  109 H. 502, 128 P.3d 815.