Farm Bureau Mut. Automobile Ins. Co. v. Violano, 54.
Decision Date | 01 December 1941 |
Docket Number | No. 54.,54. |
Citation | 123 F.2d 692 |
Parties | FARM BUREAU MUT. AUTOMOBILE INS. CO. v. VIOLANO. VIOLANO et al. v. FARM BUREAU MUT. AUTOMOBILE INS. CO. |
Court | U.S. Court of Appeals — Second Circuit |
William H. Edmunds and Guy M. Page, both of Burlington, Vt., for defendant-appellant and appellee Farm Bureau Mut. Automobile Ins. Co.
Peter Giuliani, of Montpelier, Vt., and Finn & Monti, of Barre, Vt., for plaintiff-appellant and appellee Rose Violano, adm'x.
C. O. Granai, of Barre, Vt., for defendants-appellants and appellees J. Alan Partridge and J. Arthur Partridge.
Before L. HAND, CLARK, and FRANK, Circuit Judges.
This is an appeal from a judgment holding Farm Bureau liable to the extent of $10,155 because of a judgment in the amount of $12,155 obtained by Rose Violano, as administratrix, against J. Alan Partridge for negligently causing the death of Geuseppe Violano while driving a Ford coach owned by his father, J. Arthur Partridge. Farm Bureau is admittedly liable to J. Alan in this amount under the "omnibus clause" of a policy issued to J. Arthur on the death car, unless J. Alan, at the time of the accident, was covered by other valid and collectible insurance. Such other insurance, according to Farm Bureau, was provided by a policy issued by the Shelby Mutual Plate Glass and Casualty Company. The court below held that the Shelby insurance did not apply to the accident in question, and Farm Bureau here challenges the validity of that holding. The judgment also held Farm Bureau liable to J. Alan for the expense of his defense in the suit brought against him by Mrs. Violano for $200 damages, for his confinement in jail under a body execution issued after Farm Bureau's refusal to pay the Violano judgment, and for the costs of the present action. There is a cross-appeal by Mrs. Violano, J. Alan and J. Arthur based on the court's failure to hold Farm Bureau liable for the full amount of the $12,155 judgment.
J. Arthur was the owner of four motor vehicles. Three of them, including the Ford coach which killed Violano, were insured by Farm Bureau. The policy on the coach was issued by it on February 22, 1934, and contained an omnibus clause providing that The fourth vehicle, a Ford truck, was insured by a policy subsequently issued to J. Arthur by Shelby, dated April 30, 1934. That policy also contained an omnibus clause. The situation on June 26, 1934, then, was that J. Arthur was covered for any liability as owner or operator of his Ford coach and Ford truck, and that J. Alan, his son, was protected when using either vehicle with his father's permission. On that day, J. Alan, while driving the truck on the wrong side of the road, struck another vehicle and caused damages amounting to $175. He and his father were thereupon required by the Commissioner of Motor Vehicles, pursuant to the provisions of the Vermont Financial Responsibility Law, Public Laws of Vermont 1933, §§ 5190-5199, to file "proof of financial responsibility to satisfy any claim for damages" in specified amounts.
The law is by no means unambiguous as to the necessary extent of such proof. § 5190 says financial responsibility must extend to "any claim for damages," but in § 5191, on "coverage", it was thought necessary specifically to require proof as to "all motor vehicles owned by a person." This would not, at first blush, seem to require any proof from J. Alan, who owned no vehicles, but we may assume, as the commissioner and parties seem to have assumed, that J. Alan was obligated to prove his responsibility as an operator of any cars he might drive. Since he was already covered as to his father's vehicles, all he needed to satisfy the law was coverage as to the cars of third persons. Such coverage was provided by a rider, "Auto 1-S," endorsed in typewriting upon the Shelby policy on July 16, 1934. That rider provided:
A second rider, "Auto 5-S," signed the next day, provided as follows:
A "Financial Responsibility Insurance Certificate," dated July 24, 1934, was thereupon signed by Shelby's authorized representative and filed with...
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