Dierssen v. Robinson

WARNE, J. pro tem.* This is an appeal from a judgment denying appellant’s petition for disqualification of the executor and trustee of the estate of Evelyn Dierssen Ross, deceased, on the ground of mismanagement and waste of estate properties, and also from an order settling the final and supplemental account of the executor and the decree of final distribution of the residue of said estate to said executor, in trust, to be held by him for and upon the uses and trusts contained in decedent’s will.

Appellant is the surviving brother of decedent and aside from some comparatively small bequests the other residuary legatees are his mother and his brother.

The decedent died on April 2, 1956, leaving an estate valued at over $2,500,000, including certain farm land near the mouth of the San Joaquin River, commonly known as the Dierssen Ranch, appraised at $60,000.

In his petition, the appellant contended that the said Dierssen Ranch had been mismanaged by the executor, and that waste had been committed thereon by the executor in the following particulars:

(a) That the executor had employed and continues to employ one Joe Nassano, as “foreman” and that said Joe Nassano was an individual known to the executor to be inefficient, unattentive to duty, frequently absent from the property in question, and unskilled in farming practices.

(b) That said “foreman” was permitted, by the executor, to mistreat farm equipment, permitting the said equipment to [767]deteriorate in value, become inefficient and unusable for the purpose for which it was purchased.

(c) That the refusal of the executor to expend estate moneys for the purpose of purchasing replacement farm equipment although he was advised to do so, resulted in substantial loss to the estate.

(d) That the executor in permitting the mechanical farm equipment to fall into a state of disrepair was required to expend money to cause repair which would not have been necessary had the normal care of the machinery been maintained.

(e) That the executor had known that the land, constituting a portion of said Dierssen Ranch, had a high salt content, and he further knew that the use of irrigation water upon the land would eliminate the said salt content. Nevertheless, with this knowledge, together with the knowledge of an existing water easement, he failed to provide the necessary direction to cause the flooding of the property in question, resulting in a failure of a large portion of land to produce saleable crops.