Short answer. On the current executor or administrator's complaint, the court may cite that person to appear and render a full sworn account of the estate property in their possession and their dealings with it; refusal to appear can be punished as contempt for disobeying a lawful court order.
What the law says
The court, on complaint of an executor or administrator, may cite a person entrusted by an executor or administrator with any part of the estate of the deceased to appear before it, and may require such person to render a full account, on oath, of the money, goods, chattels, bonds, accounts, or other papers belonging to such estate as came to his possession in trust for such executor or administrator, and of his proceedings thereon; and if the person so cited refuses to appear to render such account, the court may punish him for contempt as having disobeyed a lawful order of the court.
Rule 87, Section 7 — Person entrusted with estate compelled to render account. Read the full provision →
A complaint triggers the citation
Estate property does not always stay directly in the administrator's own hands; it can pass to someone else entrusted with part of it. Where that person will not account for it voluntarily, the executor or administrator may bring a complaint to the court, which may then cite the entrusted person to appear before it. This remedy exists precisely for situations like the one described: a prior administrator handed off part of the estate to someone else for safekeeping or management, and that person now sits on the property without rendering any accounting to the estate's current representative. The complaint is what sets the citation process in motion — the court does not act on its own to summon the person entrusted with the property.
What the accounting must cover
The account demanded is a full one, given on oath, covering the money, goods, chattels, bonds, accounts, or other papers belonging to the estate that came into the person's possession in trust for the executor or administrator, along with a full record of what the person did with that property afterward. Requiring the account under oath raises the stakes for the person cited — a sworn account that later proves false or incomplete exposes that person to consequences beyond a simple failure to cooperate, which is part of why the accounting cannot be given informally or in general terms.
Contempt for refusal to appear
If the person cited refuses to appear and render the account, the court may punish that refusal as contempt, treating it as disobedience of a lawful court order, which gives the executor or administrator real teeth to recover property or information that would otherwise simply be withheld indefinitely without consequence. The contempt sanction is what makes the citation more than a mere request: once the court has cited the person to appear, ignoring that citation is no longer just uncooperative behavior toward the estate, it becomes defiance of the court itself, with the penalties that follow from that.