Eagle v. Louisiana and Southern Life Insurance Company
| Decision Date | 07 August 1972 |
| Docket Number | No. 72-1110.,72-1110. |
| Citation | 464 F.2d 607 |
| Parties | Dorothy EAGLE, Plaintiff-Appellee, v. LOUISIANA AND SOUTHERN LIFE INSURANCE COMPANY, a corporation, and Multiple Business Insurance Trust, Defendants-Appellants. |
| Court | U.S. Court of Appeals — Tenth Circuit |
Maurice Sanchez, Albuquerque, N. M. (Krehbiel & Alsup, Clayton, N. M., and Grantham, Spann, Sanchez & Rager, Albuquerque, N. M., on the brief), for plaintiff-appellee.
Bruce D. Hall, Albuquerque, N. M. (Rodey, Dickason, Sloan, Akin & Robb and Robert M. St. John, Albuquerque, N. M., on the brief), for defendants-appellants.
Before BREITENSTEIN, BARRETT, and DOYLE, Circuit Judges.
In this removed action with jurisdiction dependent on diversity, plaintiff-appellee sued to recover on a group life insurance policy for the death of her husband. The trial court granted summary judgment in her favor and defendants have appealed.
Defendant-appellant Multiple Business Insurance Trust is an Alabama trust which provides group life insurance to employees of participating employers. Defendant-appellant Louisiana and Southern Life Insurance Company, a Louisiana company authorized to do business in New Mexico, issued to Trust a policy to provide group coverage for participating employers. Trust is the policyholder and employees of a participating employer are the beneficiaries under the trust agreement.
The complaint alleges that Reeves and Dougherty, who were affiliated with Insurance Consultants, Inc., were defendants' agents, "duly authorized to negotiate for insurance coverage * * * on behalf of Defendants as insurers." On May 22, 1970, Reeves and Dougherty met with representatives of Arkansas Valley Feed Yard, Inc., in Clayton, New Mexico, and solicited group life coverage for Arkansas Valley employees. Arkansas Valley executed an election to participate in the trust agreement for all of its employees and to pay all of the costs. The election stated the effective date to be June 1, 1970. Arkansas Valley gave to the solicitors its check for $663.02 to cover the initial costs.
On June 3, plaintiff's decedent was accidentally killed while engaged in his employment with Arkansas Valley. If coverage existed for Arkansas Valley, eligibility of the decedent for protection is not questioned. Insurance Company was notified of the death by a June 5 letter. On June 26 Insurance Company disapproved coverage and has refused to pay the death claim.
Both sides moved for summary judgment. The court granted plaintiff's motion and denied that of defendants. In so doing it made no statement of the facts which it deemed pertinent and gave no reasons for the actions taken.
Group life insurance is authorized in New Mexico. See N.M.S.A., 1953, § 58-8-17. The trust agreement provides that an employer "whose request to participate has been accepted by the Trustees will become a party to this Agreement," provided certain conditions, not here pertinent, are satisfied. The group policy provides that full-time employees are "eligible for insurance on the Date of the Issue of the Policy or on the date his Employer Unit is accepted by the Policyholder Trust for insurance under the Policy." Employer Unit is defined to be "any employer who has made written election to participate in the Multiple Business Insurance Trust and whose election has been approved by the Policyholder and the Company the insurer." Arkansas Valley's election to participate states: "We...
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