§ 1721. Distribution; court to order; persons entitled to shares may recover

(a) After payment of or provision for the debts, funeral charges, and expenses of administration, allowances made for the maintenance of the family and support of the minor children, and the assignment to the surviving spouse of the elective or intestate share of the decedent's estate:

(1) the executor or administrator may distribute without court order personal estate in partial or full satisfaction of legacies, bequests, and residuary interests in an aggregate amount not to exceed one-half of the remaining estate;

(2) the court, upon motion of the executor or administrator, may order partial distribution of devises, legacies, bequests, and residual shares, or order other payments, before a final accounting and distribution; and

(3) after the Probate Division of the Superior Court approves a final accounting and the Department of Taxes provides a notice of clearance, the court shall order the distribution of the remaining estate.

(b) In its orders of distribution, the court shall name the persons and proportions or parts to which each is entitled, and such persons may demand and recover their respective shares from the executor or administrator or any other person having possession of them. In the event that the assets remaining in the hands of the executor or administrator after one or more partial distributions are insufficient to satisfy the ultimate expenses and charges against the estate, those persons having received the distributions shall be liable to repay the executor or administrator on a pro rata basis. If the executor or administrator cannot collect against one or more of the persons to whom the distributions were made, the amount not recoverable shall be equitably apportioned by the court among the other persons subject to apportionment. The court may assign the claim for recovery of previously distributed assets to persons directed by the court to repay a disproportionate amount of the total.

(c) The executor or administrator shall include in its application for distribution of the residue that the decedent has been cremated and decedent's remains properly disposed of, or that a suitable gravestone has been erected or provided for at the grave of the deceased if buried in this State, and that perpetual care has been provided for the burial lot, if any. (Amended 1989, No. 142 (Adj. Sess.), § 8; 2009, No. 154 (Adj. Sess.), § 238a, eff. Feb. 1, 2011; 2017, No. 195 (Adj. Sess.), § 10.)