Collins v. Indemnity Ins. Co. of North America, 16973
| Decision Date | 07 March 1955 |
| Docket Number | No. 16973,16973 |
| Court | South Carolina Supreme Court |
| Parties | James Allen COLLINS, by Guardian ad litem, Appellant, v. INDEMNITY INSURANCE COMPANY OF NORTH AMERICA, Respondent. |
George W. Freeman, Jr., James F. Covington, Jr., Bennettsville, for appellant.
Turner, Harter & Padget, Columbia, for respondent.
This action was brought under the School Bus Insurance Act, approved June 2, 1952, XLVIII Stat. at Large, p. 3 to recover the amount of Three Thousand ($3,000.00) Dollars under the provisions of a policy of insurance issued by respondent to the State Education Finance Commission on July 15, 1953. The Act in question requires insurance coverage on all State-owned school buses operated under and used for the purposes of Article V of Act No. 379 of the Acts of 1951, XLVII Stat. at Large, pp. 546, 671, and that the insurance contracts shall provide the following benefits:
'(1) For a lawful occupant of any such school bus who suffers personal injuries or death, a death benefit of two thousand dollars ($2,000.00) and an amount sufficient to defray the cost of hospitalization, surgery, medicine, and all other other medical expenses up to three thousand dollars ($3,000.00); * * *.'
The facts, as agreed upon between the parties on February 6, 1954, are as follows:
Appellant, a minor under the age of fourteen (14) years, suffered personal injuries as the result of being struck by a school bus on December 29, 1952, under circumstances entitling him to the benefits of the Act above mentioned and the policy issued by the respondent thereunder. The total cost to January 1, 1954, of hospitalization, surgery, medicine and all other medical expenses incurred by appellant as the result of his injuries amounted to $4,788.61, as follows:
Nurses' bills totaling ............... $1,488.00
Dr. Randolph C. Charles ................. 465.00
Marlboro County General Hospital ...... 1,620.20
Dr. Kenneth M. Lynch, Jr. to 1/1/54 ..... 525.00
Roper Hospital to 1/1/54 ................ 653.41
Roper Hospital 1/21/54 to 1/23/54 ........ 37.00
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Total .............................. $4,788.61
It is noted that included in the above items is one of $37.00 for expenses at Roper Hospital from January 21, 1954 to January 23, 1954.
The agreed statement of facts does not mention when or from whom respondent received notice of the accident, or the date or dates when it made the payments hereinafter referred to. It was stated in oral argument before this court that the accident was reported to respondent by the school superintendent some four months after it had occurred, and that following receipt of such notice the Columbia agent of respondent wrote to the school superintendent inquiring as to what physician and what hospital were concerned, and as to whether the bills had been paid by appellant's parents. At any rate, following such inquiry, respondent was advised of the nurses' bills totaling $1,488 and of the bill of Dr. Randolph C. Charles in the amount of $465; and respondent thereupon paid these bills directly to the nurses and Dr. Charles. Thereafter, the bill of Marlboro County General Hospital was presented, in the amount of $1,620.20 and respondent tendered to the hospital $1,047, which was the balance of the policy coverage of three thousand ($3,000.00) dollars remaining after the payments to Dr. Charles and the nurses. This offer of payment was refused by the hospital.
The 'statement' in the transcript of record does not mention the date on which the action was commenced as required by Section 3 of Rule 4 of the Rules of this court, nor does this date appear elsewhere in the transcript. The only allegations of the complaint relating to the cost of hospitalization, surgery, medicine or other medical expenses are those of paragraph 8, reading as follows:
'That the minor plaintiff has incurred medical expenses exceeding the sum of Three Thousand ($3,000.00) Dollars, including a hospital bill to Marlboro County General Hospital in the amount of Sixteen Hundred Twenty and 20/100 ($1,620.20) Dollars, bill of Dr. Randolph C. Charles in the amount of Four Hundred Sixty-five ($465.00) Dollars, and nurses' bills of Fourteen Hundred Eighty-eight ($1,488.00) Dollars.'
It may be assumed therefore that the amounts due Dr. Lynch and Roper Hospital were unknown to the plaintiff, or at least were not considered with particularity, when the complaint was drawn, and that these amounts were not known to respondent until after the commencement of the action.
The issue involved is whether or not the payments made by respondent to the nurses and to Dr. Charles, as above set out, to that extent discharged its liability under the Act and under its policy issued pursuant thereto. Appellant contends that these payments were improper and did not operate to discharge respondent's liability to that extent, because the policy provided:
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...Bank of Aurora, Ill., supra, 186 F.Supp. at 274. The doctrine of subrogation is a creature of equity [ Collins v. Indemnity Ins. Co. of North America, 226 S.C. 567, 86 S.E.2d 578 (1955); Powers v. Calvert Fire Ins. Co., 216 S.C. 309, 57 S.E.2d 638, 16 A.L.R.2d 1261 (1950) ]; and since this ......
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