Crozier v. Provident Life & Acc. Ins. Co

• Decision Date: 30 June 1936
• Docket Number: No. 25085.,25085.
• Citation: 186 S.E. 719,53 Ga.App. 572
• Court: Georgia Court of Appeals
• Parties: CROZIER. v. PROVIDENT LIFE & ACC. INS. CO. et al.

53 Ga.App. 572

186 S.E. 719

CROZIER.

v.PROVIDENT LIFE & ACC. INS. CO. et al.

No. 25085.

Court of Appeals of Georgia, Division No. 1.

June 30, 1936.

Syllabus by Editorial Staff.

Error from Municipal Court of Atlanta; Clarence Bell, Judge.

Suit by A. W. Crozier, administratrix, against the Provident Life & Accident Insurance Company and another. To review a judgment for defendants, plaintiff brings error.

Affirmed.

Clint W. Hager, of Atlanta, for plaintiff in error.

Robert S. Sams, Robt. S. Parker, Colquitt, MacDougald, Troutman & Ark-wright, Robt. P. McLarty, and W. G. Cooper, Jr., all of Atlanta, for defendants in error.

Syllabus Opinion by the Court.

MacINTYRE, Judge.

1. If the plaintiff fails to make out a prima facie case, or if, admitting all the facts proved and all reasonable deductions from them, the plaintiff ought not to recover, a nonsuit may be ordered. Code 1933, § 110-310. The motion for nonsuit is in the nature of a demurrer to the evidence, and the only question presented by it is whether the evidence is sufficient in law to maintain the issues of fact made by the pleadings. Kelly v. Strouse & Bros., 116 Ga. 872, 43 S.E. 280; Vickers v. Atlanta, etc., Ry. Co., 64 Ga. 306. This was an action by the plaintiff against the defendants on account of alleged fraud and deceit practiced by the defendants on herintestate and deceased husband. The plaintiff charged that her husband joined the Atlanta Motor Club, upon solicitation by one Evans, agent of the defendant motor club, on the representation that by so doing there would be issued to him a policy of accident insurance in the defendant insurance company, which the defendants failed to issue, although her husband joined the automobile club under the belief that such a policy would be issued to him. The petition charges that the automobile club was the general agent of the insurance company in this transaction and in issuing insurance certificates in the company to its members. This was not a suit on a policy, but an action for damages in tort on account of alleged fraud and deceit practiced upon the plaintiff's intestate. The evidence failed to show that Evans, the agent soliciting the membership of the plaintiff's intestate in the automobile club and alleged to have represented that a membership in the association would entitle him to a certificate of insurance in the defendant company of $1,000, which would be issued to him immediately upon his joining the club, made any fraudulent misrepresentations to the plaintiff's intestate. The evidence failed to establish the fraud and deceit on the part of the defendants which were alleged as the basis of the action. Further, the plaintiff did not prove that the automobile club was the general agent of the defendant insurance company. The evidence introduced tended to show that the club acted as agent for its members in the matter of obtaining certificates in the insurance company. The evidence also tended to show that the plaintiff's intestate had been a member of the club and had a certificate of insurance the previous...