§ 15. Power of court. The court shall have power:

1. To allow claims, disallow claims, reconsider allowed or disallowed
claims, and allow or disallow them against the estate.

2. To authorize the business of assignor to be conducted for limited
periods by assignee, if necessary in the best interests of the estate,
and allow additional compensation for such services.

3. To bring in and substitute additional persons or parties in the
proceeding when necessary for the complete determination of a matter in
controversy, by issuing a citation directed to such persons or parties
and to be served as ordered by the court.

4. To reopen estates whenever it appears they were closed before being
fully administered.

5. To determine all claims of assignors to their exemptions.

6. To authorize an assignee to bring an action or special proceeding,
which he is hereby empowered to maintain, against any person who has
received, taken or in any manner interfered with the estate, property or
effects of the debtor in fraud of his creditors and which might have
been avoided by a creditor of the assignor and the assignee may recover
the property so transferred or its value.

6-a. To authorize an assignee to bring an action, which he is hereby
empowered to maintain, against any person, who with reasonable cause to
believe the assignor was insolvent as defined in section thirteen of
this act, has within four months of the assignment received a voluntary
transfer from the assignor of money or property for or on account of an
antecedent debt, the effect of which transfer is to enable the creditor
to obtain a greater percentage of his debt than some other creditor of
the same class, and the assignee may recover the property so transferred
or its value. For the purpose of this section a transfer shall be deemed
to have been made when it is so far perfected that no creditor having a
judgment on a simple contract without special priority (whether or not
such a creditor exists) could have obtained an interest superior to that
of the transferee therein. A transfer not so perfected prior to the
assignment shall be deemed to have been made immediately before the
assignment.

7. To direct upon the final settlement of the estate that the assignee
pay to the lawful creditors their proportionate dividend notwithstanding
their claim has not been presented in accordance with the notice sent
out by the assignee. If a final dividend is ordered and paid not less
than six months after notice to creditors to present their claims, the
assignee shall have no liability to creditors whose claims have not been
presented prior to entry of the order directing payment of the final
dividend and which were unknown to him at that time. The court shall
have no power to allow claims not presented within one year from the
date of the recording of the assignment.

8. To allow secured creditors such sum only as to the court seems to
be owing over and above the value of their securities.

9. To examine the parties and witnesses on oath in relation to the
assignment and accounting and all matters connected therewith and to
compel their attendance for that purpose and their answers to questions,
and the production of books and papers;

10. To require the assignee to render and file an interim account of
his proceedings within six months of assuming his duties unless the
estate is sooner distributed and to require the assignee to render and
file a final account of his proceedings, and to enforce the same in the
manner provided by law for compelling an executor or administrator to
comply with a surrogate's order for an account;

11. To take and state an interim and a final account as submitted by
the assignee, or, as to the final account, to appoint a referee to take
and state it if demanded, within ten days after the date has been fixed
for the final hearing to consider the judicial settlement of the
account, by a creditor or creditors whose claim or claims represent
one-fourth or more in amount of all claims scheduled or filed. The
referee shall be an official referee if such a referee is available and
shall have the powers enumerated in subdivision nine of this section;

12. To settle and adjudicate upon the account and the claims
presented, and to decree payment of any creditor's just proportional
part of the fund, or, in case of a partial accounting, so much thereof
as the circumstances of the case render just and proper;

13. To discharge the assignee and his surety at any time, upon
performance of the decree, from all further liability upon matters
included in the accounting, to creditors appearing and to creditors not
having appeared after due citation, or not having presented their claims
after due advertisement;

14. On proof of a composition between the assignor and his creditors,
to discharge the assignee and his sureties from all further liability to
the compounding creditors appearing or duly cited, and to authorize the
assignee to release the assets to the assignor; provided, however, that
if there be any creditors not assenting to the composition, the court
shall determine what proportion of the fund shall be paid to or reserved
for creditors not assenting, which shall not be less than the sum or
share to which they would be entitled if no composition had been made,
and may decree distribution accordingly;

15. To adjourn the proceedings from time to time, grant further orders
if necessary, and amend the petition and proceedings thereon before
decree in furtherance of justice;

16. To punish as for a contempt any disobedience or violation of any
order made or process issued in pursuance of this article, and to
restrain by arrest and imprisonment any party or witness when it shall
satisfactorily appear that such party or witness is about to leave the
jurisdiction of the court, and to take bail to secure the attendance of
such party or witness, to be prosecuted under the order of the court in
case of forfeiture by and for the benefit of the party in whose interest
such examination shall be ordered;

17. To exercise such other or further powers in respect to the
proceedings and the accounting therein as a surrogate may by law
exercise in reference to an accounting by an executor or administrator.