State v. Allen

• Decision Date: 06 April 1923
• Docket Number: No. 23778.,23778.
• Citation: 250 S.W. 366,298 Mo. 231
• Parties: STATE ex rel. MUTUAL AID UNION v. ALLEN et al., Judges.
• Court: Missouri Supreme Court

250 S.W. 366

298 Mo. 231

STATE ex rel. MUTUAL AID UNION v. ALLEN et al., Judges.

No. 23778.

Supreme Court of Missouri, Division No. 1.

April 6, 1923.

Original certiorari by the State, on the relation of the Mutual Aid Union, against William H. Alien and others, Judges of the St. Louis Court of Appeals, to quash an opinion of that court in an action by Nannie Goggin against relator (243 S. W. 244). Opinion quashed.

F. H. Bacon, of St. Louis, for relator.

N. M. Edwards and McLaran & Garesche, all of St. Louis, for respondents.

SMALL, C. I.

We issued our writ of certiorari on September 8, 1922, directed to respondents, judges of the St. Louis Court of Appeals, to certify to this court the records and proceedings in said appellate court in the cause of Nannie Goggin v. Mutual Aid Union. The case is now before us, in pursuance of our writ, for final disposition.

The petition, in this court, upon which the writ was issued, alleged, among other things, that the decision of the Court of Appeals, complained of, was contrary to the decision of this court in Little v. Union Trust Co., 197 Mo. 281, 282, 94 S. W. 890, and Roselle v. Farmers' Bank, 119 Mo. 84, 24 S. W. 744, and other cases.

It appears from the opinion of the Court of Appeals that the plaintiff Nannie Goggin sued the defendant Mutual Aid Union, a beneficiary society engaged in insuring the lives of its members in Missouri upon the mutual assessment plan, in the circuit court of the city of St. Louis, to recover upon a policy of insurance issued by the defendant upon the life of Mrs. Marian M. Dowd. The original beneficiary in the policy was Bessie Larkin, afterwards changed by Mrs. Dowd to Jennie N. Shaw. Subsequently, on November 8, 1915, Mrs. Dowd again applied for a change of beneficiary from Jennie N. Shaw to Ada L. Sullivan, and on October 25, 1910, applied to change it again from Ada L. Sullivan to Nannie Goggin, the plaintiff in said cause. Defendant Mutual Aid Union paid the sum of $837.50, the amount of the policy, into court, and filed a bill of interpleader, and was discharged from further liability on said policy, and plaintiff Nannie Goggin and defendants Ada L. Sullivan and Frank M. Slater, public administrator in charge of the estate of Marian M. Dowd, deceased, who had been made defendants in conformity with the prayer of the answer and bill of interpleader of the defendant Mutual Aid Union, were ordered to interplead for the fund paid into court. From this judgment, the plaintiff Nannie Goggin appealed to the St. Louis Court of Appeals, which reversed and remanded the case. Its opinion is found. in 213 S. W. 522. The case was remanded by that court because defendant's bill of interpleader did not set up the necessary allegations. After the case was reversed and. remanded, defendant Mutual Aid Union filed an amended answer and cross-petition, in which it undertook to bring its bill of interpleader within the requirements of the law, as held by the appellate court. Upon the retrial, after hearing the evidence on the question of defendant insurance company's right to interplead, the circuit court entered judgment that its amended answer and crossbill was a proper bill of interpleader, and on the application of said defendant, Mutual Aid Union, it having paid into court the sum of $837.50, it was decreed that said defendant be discharged from all liability to plaintiff and to defendant Slater, the public administrator, and defendant Ada M. Sullivan. From this judgment, the plaintiff again appealed to the St. Louis Court of Appeals. 243 S. W. 244.

In its opinion, which is the one before us for our consideration, the court held the allegations of the answer and cross-petition of the defendant Mutual Aid Union a good and sufficient bill of interpleader. The question with reference to the sufficiency of said bill was whether or not it showed that no act of said defendant brought about the conflicting claims to the fund in controversy which it had paid into court. In its opinion, before us for review, the learned Court of Appeals said on this point:

"If the facts alleged in defendant Mutual Aid Union's cross-petition or bill of interpleader are true, then it could not be said that any act on its part brought about the conflicting claims. What was said with respect to the allegations in the bill of interpleader when this case was here before (see Goggin v. Mutual Aid Union, supra), does not mean that the exact words, `no act on its part has brought about the conflicting,' must be used; but, if it appears from the whole of the bill of interpleader that no willful acts on its part have brought about such conflicting claims, it is a sufficient compliance with the rule therein announced. * * *

"Treating the allegations in defendant's bill of interpleader as true, which we must for the purpose of determining this question, it would clearly appear that no willful or deliberate act on its part brought about any of these conflicting claims.

"It appears from the testimony of learned counsel for defendant Mutual Aid Union that he advised counsel for Mrs. Sullivan, that the public administrator be made a party to this suit, and stated to said counsel that, unless the public administrator was made a party, he would have an administrator pendente lite appointed; that this was necessary in order to have a complete determination of the suit. In other words, learned ...