GIFT OR LOAN?

Auckland Star, Volume LX, Issue 124, 28 May 1929, Page 9

GIFT OR LOAN?

SHARES IN COMPANY. SUPREME COURT'S DECISION. A dispute over the question whether a transfer of moneys from one estate to another was a loan or a gift was heard by Mr. Justice Herdnian in the Supreme Court this morning. The parties were Mrs. A. H. Lusher and Mrs. M. Gully, representatives of a deceased child of R. A. Lusher, deceased, (Mr. Terry); and Robert John Lusher, surviving trustee of R. A. Lusher, deceased, and also one of the trustees of the estate of G. E. Lusher, deceased, who was a life tenant and widow of R. A. Lusher (Mr. Chalmers). A claim for £970 was made in respect of calls paid in 1912 on shares in the New Zealand Loan and Mercantile Agency Co., Ltd., under a scheme for the reconstruction of the company. The payments wore discovered after the death of the widow in April, 192(5, and the inquiry was for the purpose of determining on" what basis the moneys were paid —whether they were intended as a gift to tin; live children or as a loan to be repaid on the sale of the shares after the widow's death. Evidence was given by Robert J. Lusher regarding the advancement of the money, and it was stated that it was intended as a loan to protect an asset in the estate. The shares were admitted by Mr. Chalmers to be valuable, whereas, at the deatli of the testator 10 years ago, their value was assessed at nil. After hearing the evidence his Honor decided that the advance was a loan and not a gift, and ordered payment out of the estate of R. A. Lusher deceased the sum claimed to the estate of G. E. Lusher, deceased.