IDENTITY OF LEGATEE.

Manawatu Standard, Volume LVI, Issue 177, 27 June 1936, Page 7

IDENTITY OF LEGATEE.

BASIS OF CLAIM. SHARE IN ESTATE. Per Press Association. DUNEDIN, June 26. The identity of a legatee to a bequest which has lain in Chancery for the past eight years was a question which occupied the Supreme Court today when a petition under section 69 of the Trustee Act tor an order for the payment of £1124 12s 8d to John Alurphy, who claimed to be the son of the testator, Michael McKey, was brought before Mr Justice Kennedy. Evidence was submitted to show that McKey, a former well-known hotelkeeper, died in Dunedin on June 28, 1926, at the age of 94 years. He left a will made some six years prior to his death, and probate was in due course granted to the Perpetual Trustees Estate and Agency Company. The first two legacies mentioned in that will were gifts of £IOOO each to his son, John McKey, and to his daughter, Mary Ann McGready. The will made provision for his other children, and a considerable sum was also left to charities. Five years passed by and the Perpetual Trustee Company recorded that it could find no trace either of John McKey or of Mary Ann McGready, and that other children of deceased could give no information concerning these two people beyond the statement that they left New Zealand 40 or 50 years ago. and had not since been heard of. Each legacy had then increased by interest to £1124 12s Bd, and was paid into Court, in torms of the Trustee Act, to await an established claim by John McKey and Man- Ann McGready. Thus, for the last eight years, the sum of £2249 5s 4u had reposed in what might be termed “Chancery.” t „ ~ In 1933 there was living at 1 ertti, Western Australia, a man named John Murphy, aged 70. On September 12, 1933, he wrote to the registrar at Dun, edin inquiring whether his father was dead or not. The registrar sent him a copv of the death certificate, and this certificate, dated October 3, 1933, was now before the Court; Proof was submitted to show that Michael McKey before leaving Ireland bore the name of John Murphy. His Honour said that the evidence by petitioner was not in one respect quite as complete as it might be. It had been established that petitioner was probably John Murphy, but it should not be difficult to furnish further evidence to enable the Court to satisfy itself definitely that petitioner was John Alurphy. Identification rested ultimately on the affidavits o petitioner and bis wife, that was, t the extent that petitioner and his wife identified themselves. It should be east to furnish definite and independent proof of identity. There should, for example, be independent evidence of identification of photographs hr someone who knew John Murphy Ihe matter would be adjourned until July W to enable petitioner to furnish further evidence of the nature indicated. All question of costs would lx- reserved.