SECTION 3-502. SUPERVISED ADMINISTRATION; PETITION; ORDER.

SECTION 3-502. SUPERVISED ADMINISTRATION; PETITION; ORDER. A petition for supervised administration may be filed by any interested person or by a personal representative at any time or the prayer for supervised administration may be joined with a petition in a testacy or appointment proceeding. If the testacy of the decedent and the priority and qualification of any personal representative have not been adjudicated previously, the petition for supervised administration shall include the matters required of a petition in a formal testacy proceeding and the notice requirements and procedures applicable to a formal testacy proceeding apply. If not previously adjudicated, the court shall adjudicate the testacy of the decedent and questions relating to the priority and qualifications of the personal representative in any case involving a request for supervised administration, even though the request for supervised administration may be denied. After notice to interested persons, the court shall order supervised administration of a decedent’s estate:
(1) if the decedent’s will directs supervised administration, it shall be ordered unless the court finds that circumstances bearing on the need for supervised administration have changed since the execution of the will and that there is no necessity for supervised administration;
(2) if the decedent’s will directs unsupervised administration, supervised administration shall be ordered only upon a finding that it is necessary for protection of persons interested in the estate; or
(3) in other cases if the court finds that supervised administration is necessary under the circumstances.
Comment
The expressed wishes of a testator regarding supervised administration should bear upon, but not control, the question of whether supervised administration will be ordered. This section is designed to achieve a fair balance between the wishes of the decedent, and the interests of successors in regard to supervised administration.

379

Since supervised administration normally will result in an adjudicated distribution of the estate, the issue of will or no will must be adjudicated. This section achieves this by forcing a petition for supervised administration to include matters necessary to put the issue of testacy before the court. It is possible, however, that supervised administration will be requested because administrative complexities warranting it develop after the issue of will or no will has been resolved in a previously concluded formal testacy proceeding.
It should be noted that supervised administration, though it compels a judicial settlement of an estate, is not the only route to obtaining judicial review and settlement at the close of an administration. The procedures described in Sections 3-1101 and 3-1102 are available for use by or against personal representatives who are not supervised. Also efficient remedies for breach of duty by a personal representative who is not supervised are available under Part 6 of this article. Finally, each personal representative consents to jurisdiction of the court as invoked by mailed notice of any proceeding relating to the estate which may be initiated by an interested person. Also, persons interested in the estate may be subjected to orders of the court following mailed notices made in proceedings initiated by the personal representative. In combination, these possibilities mean that supervised administration will be valuable principally to persons who see some advantage in a single judicial proceeding which will produce adjudications on all major points involved in an estate settlement.