Corcoran ex rel. Dill v. Mutual Life Insurance
Corcoran ex rel. Dill v. Mutual Life Insurance
Opinion of the Court
.'Opinion by
This case was here one year ago, and is reported in 179 Pa. 132. It was sent back for a new trial, which has now been had and is again in tins Court on appeal. The questions raised and decided when it was here in 1896 are not again presented, as the learned judge appears to have followed the rules laid down by us at that time. Another question is raised however, and upon substantially the same facts that were presented on the former trial. The defendant company issued a policy upon the life of James Corcoran in 1877. It was payable to his wife Frances Corcoran, if living at his decease. He died in 1894. She survived him and not long after his death made the requisite proofs, alleged loss of the policy to excuse her failure to produce it, and received payment of the insurance money from the company. In February, 1895, Philson brought this suit as the assignee and owner of the policy. On the trial he presented the assignment of the policy by James and Frances Corcoran to W. H. Dill as collateral security for the payment of a note for $2500 which Dill had indorsed for Corcoran, and which had been discounted by Philson’s bank. This note was not paid at maturity, and the indorser assigned the policy over to Philson ■as security for the note so held by him. The company replied •to this, showing that it had paid the insurance money to the payee named in the policy, and without notice of Philson’s claim. It also set up and relied on the stipulation in the policy that provided “ This company will not take notice of any assignment of this policy until a duplicate or certified copy thereof shall be delivered to the company at its'principal office,” and proved by its clerks and bookkeepers that no such duplicate or certified copy had ever been furnished to the company. Philson did not allege that he had filed a copy of the assignment with the company, but set up a waiver of a strict compliance with the rule and an acceptance of the production and exhibition of the assignment in the office of Mr. Lambert, the general agent of the company, in Philadelphia, as a sufficient notice of its existence and character. In support of this proposition he proved that the secretary of the company directed Him by letter to communicate with Mr. Lambert in regard to his alleged assignment and notice thereof to the company, and that soon after, viz :• April, 1892, he sent the policy and the assignment of Corcoran and wife to
We see no error in the answer to the plaintiff’s first point. If Dill, the indorser, transferred the assignment of the policy to Philson to secure the same debt to secure which it had been assigned to him, we think the title vested in Philson so far as that
The answer to the defendant’s seventh point is unobjectionable. • Whether Philson was misled or not by what transpired in Mr. Lambert’s office was a question of fact in the determination of which the letter written by Philson to Corcoran in June, 1892, was to be considered, and to be given such weight as the jury thought it entitled to.
Upon a consideration of all the assignments of error the judgment is affirmed.
Reference
- Full Case Name
- Frances Corcoran, for the use of W. H. Dill, for the use of S. B. Philson, Cashier v. Mutual Life Insurance Company of New York
- Cited By
- 6 cases
- Status
- Published
- Syllabus
- Insurance — Life insurance — - Notice of assignment — Waiver—Evidence— Question for jury. In an action against a life insurance company by the assignee of a policy of insurance containing a stipulation that “this company will not take notice of any assignment of this policy until a duplicate or certified copy thereof shall be delivered to the company at its principal office,” it was not claimed that a duplicate or certified copy of the assignment had been delivered, but it was averred that the company had waived the stipulation. The plaintiff offered evidence which tended to show that in accordance with instructions from the secretary of the company plaintiff had sent the policy and the assignment to the office of a general agent of the company; that in the absence of the general agent these papers were presented to a clerk in the office who took and examined them, walked a short distance to a book in which he appeared to make entries, and then returned to the messenger and handed the papers back to him. Held, that the evidence was for the jury to determine whether the company had waived the stipulation in the policy as to filing a duplicate or certified copy at the principal office. Evidence — Province of court and jury. If the evidence is direct and certain, presenting no question of credibility, and leaving no sufficient ground for inconsistent inference of fact, the court may be asked to instruct the jury as to its legal effect. But if it is uncertain, if it depends on the credibility of witnesses, and if there is room for drawing from it different inferences of fact, it must go to the jui'yi They must clear up the doubts, settle questions of credibility, draw the correct inferences, and give final shape to the findings of fact. Insurance — Life insurance — Assignment of policy as collateral security. Where an indorser of a promissory note to whom a policy of insurance has been assigned as collateral transfers the assignment to the holder of the no.te to secure the same debt to secure which the policy had been assigned to him, the title vests in the transferee of the indorser, so far as that is necessary to enable the latter to hold the policy as collateral security for the debt and to sustain an action upon the policy. Promissory note — Renewal note — Collateral security. Where a policy of life insurance has been assigned as collateral security for the payment of a promissory note a renewal of the note will not destroy the assignment if such was not the intention of the parties.