Disbursement of trust assets; MCL 700.7816; Final accounting; Fees charged by the successor trustee

The court remanded the probate court’s order approving the final account of appellee-Rizik, as successor trustee of the Beverly Howe Family Trust (the Family Trust), discharging Rizik as a fiduciary, and closing the file. It instructed the probate court on remand to provide factual findings as to appellant-Thomas Howe’s specific challenges to Rizik’s fees and charges sufficient to facilitate appellate review. Thomas argued that “the probate court erred by approving Rizik’s final account as successor trustee where Rizik disbursed assets from the Family Trust to pay for the care and maintenance of Beverly, who was not a beneficiary under the trust instrument.” The thrust of his argument was that “Rizik did not have authority to disburse trust funds for Beverly’s care and expenses.” However, he did not provide the court with an itemized list of disbursements that he challenged on appeal. Also, based on the record, he “did not indicate the specific disbursements or sum total of the disbursements that he deemed improper. Rather, appellant appeared to have raised a general objection to ‘Petitioner’s use of any of this money for a nonbeneficiary as it is not permitted by the Trust Code of Michigan . . . .’” The court noted that some of the disbursements “were approved in prior court orders, without objection, and Thomas did not appeal those orders.” He sought to appeal them as part of this appeal. However, the court “partially dismissed this appeal for lack of jurisdiction as it related to those prior orders, and also denied Thomas’s motion for reconsideration of that decision, because the prior orders were each final orders appealable by right under MCR 5.801(A)(2),” and he failed to timely appeal them. The court held that he was “not permitted to challenge any disbursements that were previously approved by the probate court, and for which Thomas did not file an appeal by right. Such action would amount to an impermissible collateral attack on these prior orders.” However, in approving Rizik’s final account, the probate court “did not address Thomas’s challenges to Rizik’s fees and charges. Without any findings or an explanation of the probate court’s decisions on these contested issues, this Court, as an error-correcting Court, is not in a position to review the probate court’s ultimate determination or determine whether it erred by approving the contested fees and charges.”