Barton v. National Life Assur. Co. of Canada
| Decision Date | 12 October 1977 |
| Citation | 91 Misc.2d 951,398 N.Y.S.2d 941 |
| Parties | Karniff BARTON, as Administrator of Delores Barton, Deceased, Plaintiff, v. NATIONAL LIFE ASSURANCE COMPANY OF CANADA, Defendant. |
| Court | New York City Court |
Delores Barton died a resident of Queens County, New York City in February, 1974. Limited Letters of Administration were issued by the Kings County Surrogate's Court on May 13, 1974. The deceased's heirs are two children, Andre Barton, who is an infant, and Sandra Barton, both residents of Kings County.
The estate is the beneficiary of a life insurance policy issued by defendant on the life of the deceased in 1965 in Jamaica, where she then resided. The defendant is a foreign insurance company organized under the laws of the Dominion of Canada, with a home office at Toronto, and authorized to do business in the State of New York and the Commonwealth of Jamaica.
The facts have been presented largely by stipulation or uncontroverted statements of fact in memoranda submitted by the parties.
The insured moved to New York City prior to 1969 and resided here until her death. The policy had earlier lapsed but was reinstated by deceased in Brooklyn, New York as of July 5, 1969.
The plaintiff seeks payment of the proceeds of the policy in United States dollars and in this country. The defendant resists payment here and in such currency and bases its resistance on an endorsement to the policy which reads:
"Notwithstanding anything herein contained, it is hereby provided that all payments to be made hereunder, either to or by the Company, shall be made in Jamaica Pounds at the Principal Office of the Company in Jamaica."
Jamaica converted its currency from pounds to dollars on September 8, 1969 with a conversion rate of two Jamaica dollars for one Jamaica pound. Thus the amount of insurance involved was converted from 2,000 Jamaica pounds to 4,000 Jamaica dollars.
Upon proof of death of the insured defendant delivered to plaintiff a check in the sum of Jamaica dollars $4327.47.
The check was returned unpaid. Jamaica has an Exchange Control Law which provides that permission of the Exchange Control Authority of Jamaica be obtained for the transfer to a nonresident of Jamaica of the right to receive sums assured by a policy of insurance (Jamaica Exchange Control Law Sec. 30(1)). No permission had been granted.
Prior to the occasion of the refusal to permit payment of the check involved in this case, defendant successfully sought the permission of the Exchange Control Authority of Jamaica to transfer outside of Jamaica proceeds of other insurance contracts made in Jamaica. After defendant attempted to obtain a currency permit to authorize the transfer to a New York account of the proceeds of its check to the plaintiff, defendant was informed by the Director of Exchange Control on January 31, 1977:
The defendant urges that it has no other duty than to pay the proceeds to the credit of plaintiff in Jamaica, and the amount may then be added to plaintiff's restricted assets in Jamaica.
The Court disagrees. The obligation of the defendant is to pay the money to the beneficiary, not to the credit of the beneficiary in the form of restricted assets.
Our Court of Appeals long ago held in St. John v. The American Mutual Life Insurance Co., 13 N.Y. 31 (1855):
"An insurance upon the life of an individual is a contract by which the insurer, for a certain sum of money or premium proportioned to the age, health, profession, and other circumstances of the person whose life is insured, engages that if such person shall die within the period limited in the policy, the insurer shall pay the sum specified in the policy, according to the terms thereof, to the person in whose favor such policy is granted."
Our entire jurisprudence is imbued with the concept of construing policies to protect the insured (National Service Corp. v. U. S. Fidelity and Guaranty Co., 364 F.2d 275, 277, (2 Cir. 1966)) and to guard that the intended beneficiary receive the proceeds. Indeed as one court put it:
"It is not easy to perceive why a different rule of construction should be applied to the clause of a life insurance policy providing for the disposition of the money to become due under it from that applicable to a testamentary disposition, where both have the same object; i. e. provision for those who are the natural objects of the assured's or the testator's bounty." (Dunn v. New Amsterdam Casualty Co., 141 App.Div. 478, 126 N.Y.S. 229).
The Government of Jamaica has itself agreed with the Government of the United States to interpose no obstacle to the acquisition by donees or heirs of the personal property of their donors or testators.
Jamaica attained full responsible status within the British Commonwealth on August 6, 1962. By an exchange of notes on that date between the High Commissioner for the United Kingdom in Jamaica and the Prime Minister of External Affairs and Defense of Jamaica, the Government of Jamaica agreed to assume, from August 6, 1972, all obligations and responsibilities which arise from any valid international instrument ("Treaties in Force", U.S. Department of State Publication # 8891, compiled by the Treaty Affairs Staff, Office of the Legal Adviser, United States Department of State).
Among the international instruments whose obligations were assumed by Jamaica is the Convention between the United States and the United Kingdom relating to the tenure and disposition of real and personal property, signed at Washington, D.C. March 2, 1899 and applicable to Jamaica February 9, 1901 (31 Stat. 1939)
The Convention was thereafter supplemented in a manner not here material (55 Stat. 1101).
Article II of the 1899 Convention provides "The citizens or subjects of each of the Contracting Parties shall have full powers to dispose of their personal property within the territories of the other, by testament, donation, or otherwise; and their heirs, legatees, and donees, being citizens or subjects of the other Contracting Party, whether resident or non-resident, shall succeed to their said personal property,...
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Barton v. National Life Assur. Co. of Canada
...Brooklyn, for plaintiff-respondent. Before BUSCHMANN, P. J., and MANGANO and HIRSCH, JJ. Judgment of the court below (see 91 Misc.2d 951, 398 N.Y.S.2d 941) unanimously reversed with $30 costs and complaint dismissed. Plaintiff seeks to require defendant insurer to pay the proceeds of a life......