Continental Casualty Company v. Jackson

• Decision Date: 12 August 1968
• Docket Number: No. 18903.,18903.
• Citation: 400 F.2d 285
• Parties: CONTINENTAL CASUALTY COMPANY, Appellant, v. James A. JACKSON and William R. Jackson, by His Brother and Next Friend, James A. Jackson, Appellees.
• Court: U.S. Court of Appeals — Eighth Circuit

400 F.2d 285 (1968)

CONTINENTAL CASUALTY COMPANY, Appellant, v. James A. JACKSON and William R. Jackson, by His Brother and Next Friend, James A. Jackson, Appellees.

No. 18903.

United States Court of Appeals Eighth Circuit.

August 12, 1968.

John A. Blanchard, of Hurlburt, Blanchard, Cless & Porter, Des Moines, Iowa, for appellant; Philip H. Cless, Des Moines, Iowa, on the brief.

Max Putnam, Des Moines, Iowa, for appellees.

Before VOGEL, Senior Circuit Judge, LAY, Circuit Judge, and BECKER, Chief District Judge.

LAY, Circuit Judge.

The Continental Casualty Company appeals after a denial of its motion for judgment notwithstanding verdict and for a new trial after an unfavorable verdict was rendered against it on an accidental death policy. The plaintiffs are beneficiaries of the insured, Robert D. Jackson, deceased. On February 6, 1965, the decedent-insured was stricken with a heart attack after assisting in the manual carriage of one Herman F. Anderson, his father-in-law, from the bathroom to the den of the Anderson residence. At the time of his death the insured was a Judge of the Iowa District Court in Des Moines, Iowa. The decedent, Judge Robert D. Jackson, was hospitalized on the same day and died on February 18, 1965, as a result of a myocardial infarction.

The accidental death policy in question insures against "bodily injury caused by an accident occurring while this policy is in force and resulting directly and independently of all other causes in loss covered by this policy." The jury found that the death of the decedent was caused by an "accident" within the meaning of the policy and awarded a verdict for the full coverage. Continental Casualty Company brings this appeal on the grounds:

1. That there was insufficient evidence to sustain a finding of liability under the policy

(a) in that the decedent was not the victim of an "accident" because he was engaged in a voluntary act at the time of his heart attack, and

(b) in that the decedent's death did not result "directly and independently of all other causes of loss covered by this policy."

2. The defendant also requests a new trial alleging that the court erred in admitting certain evidence.

We affirm.

It is stipulated that the policy is to be interpreted and governed by Iowa law.

The facts briefly summarized show that decedent's father-in-law, Herman Anderson, became sick and disabled as he was getting out of his car. He later recovered. He was assisted by an Emil Carlson into his house to the bathroom. A short time later Mr. Anderson called for help as he could not get up from the toilet stool. Judge Jackson and his son, William Jackson, age 19, were summoned and arrived some ten or fifteen minutes later. The three men decided to carry Mr. Anderson from the bathroom to the den and place him upon a couch. Carlson held Anderson around the shoulders beneath the armpit, William Jackson took a position at the midsection area and the decedent lifted his thighs and ankles. William Jackson stated that the three of them lifted Mr. Anderson from the toilet stool, prying his hand off the seat itself and his one leg or foot from the lavatory support. The testimony shows that in the process of the carriage Herman Anderson grabbed onto the bathroom door frame and various objects while he was being removed. Mr. Anderson also placed his hands against the wall and throughout the carriage was "completely uncooperative." William Jackson asked him not to grab onto these things but he continued to do so. Herman Anderson himself testified that he did not remember any of the events which had transpired and that he thought he had been unconscious. The testimony is that as Mr. Anderson grabbed onto the various objects and walls, he disrupted the carriage and caused a jerking motion. This testimony demonstrates that there was an unusual strain placed upon the various parties throughout their movements in carrying Mr. Anderson. William Jackson testified that the jerking motion tended to stop them "just like box cars hitting together." This testimony was stricken by the trial court, but the testimony that there was a jerking motion throughout their movements remained.

The evidence established that the decedent had had no symptoms of prior heart trouble. Shortly after carrying Mr. Anderson, the decedent experienced severe chest pain and was thereafter admitted to the hospital. He suffered a "coronary artery occlusion" with resultant myocardial damage. Twelve days later he died. His family doctor, Dr. Anderson, and a specialist in internal medicine, Dr. Chambers, both testified that the "probable cause of the myocardial infarction * * * was the heavy lifting previous to the chest pain." The evidence shows that when an "infarction" occurs, the heart muscle is damaged because a blood clot occurs depriving the muscle of proper circulation. Dr. Chambers specifically related causation to a "serious strain," pain and the shock which occurred. Dr. Chambers made a finding of coronary artery disease, which he indicated was a generic term covering coronary occlusion. He added, "quite usually" infarction was just the end result of arteriosclerosis. The underlying cause is coronary heart disease. However, Dr. Chambers specifically stated on cross-examination that he did not find that the decedent had arteriosclerotic disease. No autopsy was performed. He stated that "an excessive strain which causes a greater demand on the heart muscle than it normally is expected to produce may cause * * * the process * * * described as myocardial infarction."

Dr. Chambers related the strain to the "timing" and added "he might have lived longer under better circumstances with the same amount of coronary artery disease." He stated that in his experience he has never seen a case which did not have an underlying disease as the functioning cause. And finally, Dr. Chambers added that in his opinion the strain combined with the disease to produce the occlusion which then resulted in the infarction. He described the "strain" as the "provocative" cause. The defendant called two heart specialists. Both doctors in substance related that extraordinary physical strain can initiate events leading to a myocardial infarction but that the major contributing cause of Judge Jackson's death was the arteriosclerotic condition of his arteries.

THE "ACCIDENT" QUESTION

The trial court instructed the jury as to the definition of accident:

"The word `accident\' as used in this case means happening by chance, unexpectedly taking place, not according to the usual course of things.

"You are instructed in this regard that if the insured does a voluntary act, the natural and usual, and to be expected result of which is to bring injury upon himself, then a death so occurring is not an accident. But if the insured does a voluntary act, without knowledge or reasonable expectation that the result thereof will be to bring injury upon himself from which death may follow, then a bodily injury resulting in death is caused by an accident."

We think this instruction clearly reflects proper definition under Iowa law. Cf. Poweshiek County Nat'l Bank v. Nationwide Mut. Ins. Co., 156 N.W.2d 671, 679 (Iowa 1968). Defendant filed an exception to the court's instruction in that it failed to instruct in order to be an "accident" something "unforeseen, unexpected or unusual must occur in the act which precedes the injury." But this request does not accurately reflect Iowa law. See Comfort v. Continental Cas. Co., 239 Iowa 1206, 34 N.W.2d 588, 590 (1948).¹ We find no error in the court's instruction defining the meaning of "accident" under Iowa law.

On rehearing² the Iowa Supreme Court in Lickleider v. Iowa State Traveling Men's Ass'n, 184 Iowa 423, 166 N.W. 363, 367 (1918) quoted with approval from an 1898 Eighth Circuit opinion. The Iowa Supreme Court said:

"The rule, clearly deducible from the overwhelming weight of authority, is that when injury or death follows or results from a voluntary act of the insured, and the act is one which is not manifestly dangerous, but which is ordinarily done or performed without serious consequences to the doer, such result is caused by accidental means. This is nowhere better stated than by Sanborn, J., in Western Commercial Travelers Association v. Smith, 85 Fed. 401, 29 C.C.A. 223, 40 L.R.A. 653, where he says:

"`An effect which does not ordinarily follow and cannot be reasonably anticipated from the use of those means, an effect which the actor did not intend to produce and * * * cannot be charged with the design of producing, * * * is produced by accidental means.\'"

See also Comfort v. Continental Cas. Co., supra. In Lickleider the insured had experienced an excessive strain in "jerking" off a tire casing. The court held these facts to be sufficient to submit to a jury to determine whether an "accident" had occurred within the meaning of the policy. The Iowa Supreme Court relied upon the early decision of the United States Supreme Court in United States Mut. Accident Ass'n v. Barry, 131 U.S. 100, 9 S.Ct. 755, 33 L.Ed. 60 (1889), stating:

"There Dr. Barry, with two or three companions, in leaving a railway station platform jumped to the ground below, a distance of four or five feet. His act was perfectly voluntary, but in some way not shown by any direct proof he sustained a jar which it was claimed caused an injury to his bowels, resulting in his death, and although there was no evidence by any witness that he was seen to slip or fall, or that he alighted in any other manner than he intended, it was held that the jury were at liberty to find that by some unexpected or unforeseen or involuntary movement of his body in his descent from the platform to the ground the injury was caused. The Supreme Court also examined and approved an instruction to the jury to the effect that while if Barry jumped and alighted just as he intended, and nothing unforeseen, unexpected, or involuntary occurred

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