Gen. Accident Fire & Life Assur. Corp. v. Hanley Oil Co.

• Decision Date: 26 February 1947
• Citation: 72 N.E.2d 1,321 Mass. 72
• Court: United States State Supreme Judicial Court of Massachusetts Supreme Court
• Parties: GENERAL ACCIDENT FIRE & LIFE ASSUR. CORPORATION, Limited, v. HANLEY OIL CO., Inc., et al.

321 Mass. 72

72 N.E.2d 1

GENERAL ACCIDENT FIRE & LIFE ASSUR. CORPORATION, Limited,

v.HANLEY OIL CO., Inc., et al.

Supreme Judicial Court of Massachusetts, Suffolk.

Feb. 26, 1947.

Exceptions and appeal from Superior Court, Suffolk County; Brogna, Judge.

Proceeding by the General Accident Fire & Life Assurance Corporation, Limited, against the Hanley Oil Company, Inc., and another to obtain an adjudication that the plaintiff was not obligated under a motor vehicle liability policy issued by it to the named defendant to defend or pay any judgment in an action brought against the insured by the other defendant. From the judgment rendered the plaintiff brought the case to the Supreme Judicial Court both on exceptions and on appeal.

Exceptions dismissed and decree affirmed.

K. C. Parker, of Boston, for plaintiff.

E. McPartlin, of Boston, for defendant Hanley Oil Co., Inc.

R. M. Morrison, of Boston, for defendant Simon, II.

Before FIELD, C. J., and QUA, RONAN, WILKINS, and SPALDING, JJ.

WILKINS, Justice.

This is a proceeding under G.L.(Ter.Ed.) c. 231A, inserted by St.1945, c. 582, § 1, whereby the plaintiff (hereinafter called the insurance company) seeks an adjudication that it is not obligated under a motor vehicle liability policy issued by it to the defendant Hanley Oil Co. Inc. (hereinafter called the insured) to defend, or pay any judgment in, an action brought against the insured by the defendant Simon.

By ‘Coverage C’ of the policy, issued January 1, 1943, the insurance company, up to a limit of $5,000, agreed ‘To pay on behalf of the insured all sums which the insured shall become obligated to pay by reason of the liability imposed upon him by law for damages because of injury to or destruction of property, including the loss of use thereof, caused by accident and arising out of the ownership, maintenance or use of the motor vehicle.’ Whether a further provision that ‘use of the motor vehicle for the purposes stated includes the loading and unloading thereof’ added to the coverage need not be determined. But see Diggins v. Theroux, 314 Mass. 735, 736, 737, 51 N.E.2d 425.

On April 16, 1943, about 10 A.M., the insured's motor truck stopped on the public highway adjacent to the house of the defendant Simon, in the cellar of which was a tank for the storage of oil with an outside fill pipe. An employee of the insured connected the fill pipe with a hose which was part of the equipment of the truck. By means of a mechanism with which the truck was equipped, oil was then pumped through the hose into the tank, but in greater quantity than the tank had capacity to hold, with the consequence that a substantial quantity of oil flowed upon the floor of the cellar. The truck was driven away. About 1:20 P.M. the oil on the cellar floor became ignited, and the house and its contents were damaged by fire, the proximate cause of which was the acts of the insured.

The foregoing facts, which appear from the pleadings, were the only evidence before the judge, who filed ‘Findings, rulings and order for judgment,’ wherein it was said that after the oil had been pumped into the house no human agency intervened in any way to...