LSU Law: Digest of 1808

TITLE III - OF ABSENT PERSONS

CHAPTER I - OF THE CURATORSHIP OF ABSENT PERSONS

Art. 1. When a person possessed of either moveable or immoveable property within this territory, shall be absent, or shall reside out of the said territory, without having appointed some body to take care of his or her said estate, or when the person thus appointed, dies, or is either unable or unwilling to continue to administer the said estate, then and in that case, the judge of the parish where the estate is situated, shall appoint a curator to administer the same.

Art. 2. In the appointment of this curator, the judge shall prefer the wife of the absentee to his presumptive heirs, the presumptive heirs to the other relations; the relations to strangers, and creditors to those who are not otherwise interested, provided however that the said persons be possessed of the necessary qualifications.

Art. 3. The curator appointed to the absentee, shall take an oath well and faithfully to fulfil the duties of his administration and to give an account of it to whomsoever it may belong.
It is further his duty to cause a good and faithful inventory, with an appraisement of the property entrusted to his keeping, to be made by the parish judge or by any notary public duly authorised, to that effect, by the said judge, and to give a good and sufficient security of the amount of this inventory for his administration.

Art. 4. The curator of the absentee, has no other power than that of administering the estate of the absentee, without having a right to alienate or mortgage the estate entrusted to his care, under any pretence whatsoever.
He is moreover bound with respect to this administration by the same obligations, responsibility and mortgage by which tutors are bound, and he enjoys the same annual compensation as an indemnity for his services.

Art. 5. So long as this curatorship continues, all suits in which the absentee is interested, shall be prosecuted by or against the curator.

Art. 6. The curatorship of the absentee is at an end:-
1^st. When the absentee or person residing out of the territory, appoints an attorney in fact for the administration of his or her estate, whether it be the person who was appointed curator or any other person:
2^d. When after a certain time, without hearing of the absentee, the heirs of the absentee, cause themselves to be put provisionally in possession of his or her estate, in conformity with the law.

Art. 7. The curator of the absentee is bound to give an account of his administration as soon as it is at an end, either by the appointment of an attorney in fact by the absentee, or the putting into provisional possession of the heirs of the absentee.

Art. 8. When an absentee not possessed of an estate within this territory susceptible of being administered by a curator, shall be either directly or indirectly interested in any suit, it shall be the duty of the judge before whom the suit shall be pending, to appoint a proper person to defend the rights of the absentee, if he be not otherwise represented within this territory, and if he has not himself appointed an attorney.

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