Ryan v. Continental Casualty Co.

• Decision Date: 10 March 1931
• Docket Number: No. 5869.,5869.
• Citation: 47 F.2d 472
• Parties: RYAN v. CONTINENTAL CASUALTY CO.
• Court: U.S. Court of Appeals — Fifth Circuit

47 F.2d 472 (1931)

RYAN v. CONTINENTAL CASUALTY CO.

No. 5869.

Circuit Court of Appeals, Fifth Circuit.

March 10, 1931.

T. Paine Kelly and W. B. Lindsay, both of Tampa, Fla. (W. B. Lindsay, T. Paine Kelly, and J. W. B. Shaw, all of Tampa, Fla., on the brief), for appellant.

R. W. Shackleford and Morris E. White, both of Tampa, Fla. (Robert W. Shackleford and Shackleford, Ivy, Farrior & Shannon, all of Tampa, Fla., on the brief), for appellee.

Before FOSTER, SIBLEY, and WALKER, Circuit Judges.

WALKER, Circuit Judge.

This was an action by the appellant on a policy issued by the appellee whereby the latter promised to pay to the former a stated sum for the loss of life of Charles J. Ryan, her husband, "resulting from a personal injury which is effected solely and independently of all other causes by the happening of an external, violent and purely accidental event." The evidence showed as follows: At the time of his death the insured was forty-four years of age. Prior to his assisting in loading ice in a railroad car on the morning of his death he appeared to be in good health. While an employee of the ice company of which insured was the manager was engaged in loading ice into the car the insured took part in that task. While pulling ice from a truck into the car he slid and sat down, and he fell a second time on his face. Then he got up, held one hand on his chest, and walked to a platform on which he laid down. After lying there for awhile he got up and went to his home in an automobile driven by his son. He died about thirty or forty minutes after reaching his home. A physician found him there in a state of shock, cold, clammy, and pale, and complaining of pain in his chest. The physician stated that he had his hand on deceased's pulse when it stopped; that his pulse was good right up to the time it stopped, but it stopped very suddenly, and he went right into a convulsion and died. He also stated that he was at a loss as to the cause of the death until he heard that the undertaker had found that there was a leak, and he then guessed it was a ruptured aorta; that he did not see any external evidence of an injury; and that he did not know that it is possible, from a medical standpoint, for the aorta of the human body to be ruptured by any fall, no matter how violent, unless there was some external evidence of that fall. One would have no feeling after the rupture of the aorta, as death at once would follow such a rupture. The undertaker who embalmed the deceased's body testified that in injecting the embalming fluid the face and upper part of the body responded, but that it appeared that there was no circulation in the lower part of the body, which led him to believe that there was an obstruction or rupture which interfered with the circulation. After the body had been embalmed there was an autopsy. The report of the physician who conducted the autopsy stated:

"No external signs of violence on body.

"Thoracic cavity; lungs looked apparently normal.

"Heart; phecardium had a number of small holes about the eighth of an inch in diameter, muscles of the heart proper had a like condition, that is a number of perforations throughout its substance, also the arch of the aorta had a hole in it.

"The perforations of the heart were most likely made by use of...