1444.5. Notwithstanding any other provision of law, any money on deposit with the county treasurer of a county received from a public administrator of the county in trust and to the account of the estate of a deceased person or the creditor of a deceased person, in an amount of fifty dollars ($50) or less as to any one estate or creditor, and not covered by a decree of distribution, which was received or remained on hand after the final accounting in such deceased person’s estate and the discharge of such public administrator as representative of the estate, and where the money has so remained on deposit in trust for a period of 15 years or more unclaimed by any heir, devisee or legatee of such deceased person, or by any creditor having an allowed and approved claim against the deceased person’s estate remaining unpaid, shall be deemed permanently escheated to the State of California. The total of any such moneys so held in trust unclaimed for such period may be paid in a lump sum by the county treasurer, from such funds as he may have on hand for the purpose, to the State Treasurer, at the time of the next county settlement after the effective date of this section, or at any county settlement thereafter. Such lump sum payment may be made by designating it to have been made under this section, without the necessity of any further report or statement of the estates or claimants concerned, without the necessity of any order of court, and without being subject to the provisions of Section 1311 or 1312. Upon receipt by the State Treasurer, any permanently escheated money received by him under this section shall forthwith be deposited in the School Land Fund, subject only to the rights of minors and persons of unsound mind saved to them by Section 1430.
This section shall also apply in all respects to any money on deposit with a county treasurer received from the coroner of the county in trust and to the account of a deceased person, and any such money shall be held, deemed permanently escheated, reported and paid over in like manner as hereinabove set forth.
(Added by Stats. 1957, Ch. 1375.)