Ætna Life Ins. Co. v. Fitzgerald

• Decision Date: 11 October 1905
• Docket Number: No. 20,630.,20,630.
• Citation: 75 N.E. 262,165 Ind. 317
• Parties: ÆTNA LIFE INS. CO. v. FITZGERALD.
• Court: Indiana Supreme Court

165 Ind. 317

75 N.E. 262

ÆTNA LIFE INS. CO.

v.FITZGERALD.

No. 20,630.

Supreme Court of Indiana.

Oct. 11, 1905.

Appeal from Superior Court, Marion County; Vinson Carter, Judge.

Action by Philander Fitzgerald against the Ætna Life Insurance Company. From a judgment in favor of plaintiff, defendant appeals. Reversed. Case transferred from Appellate Court, as authorized by Burns' Ann. St. 1901, § 1337u.Miller, Elam, Fesler & Miller, for appellant. R. W. McBride and Denny & Denny, for appellee.

GILLETT, J.

Action by appellee against appellant on an accident policy. By the contract the company insured appellee “against loss of business time *** resulting from bodily injuries effected during the term of this insurance through external, violent and accidental means.” The motion for a new trial presents the question as to whether the disability involved was due to an injury within the terms of the policy. It appears from the testimony that on July 31, 1902, appellee, being much fatigued from an extended business trip, retired about 8 p. m. As he was somewhat restless, he placed his left hand between the pillow and his head, in order to raise it higher. The hand was placed on edge, with the thumb next to the head, and he fell asleep in that position. Some time during the night, while asleep, he moved so that his hand, with his head continuing upon it as before, rested upon the edge of the bed rail, and he continued to sleep in that posture until 4 a. m., when he awoke. He found that his hand was wholly numb, and it continued in that condition for the space of half an hour. There was a black mark upon it, where it had rested upon the rail, and this mark existed for some time thereafter. The hand pained him a great deal during the following day, and during the next night he was compelled to call a physician. The testimony of the latter, as well as that of the family physician, who took charge of the case upon returning from a vacation, shows that the pressure on the hand while upon the bed rail resulted in an inflammation of the periosteum of the metacarpal bones lying back of the third and fourth fingers, a condition which made an operation necessary and caused a protracted illness. The expert evidence shows that cases of inflammation of the periosteum, or, as the difficulty is technically termed, periostitis, are traumatic, at least for the most part, and that it is the opinion of the medical profession that all of such cases are due to some injury, perhaps forgotten.

The principal contention of counsel for appellant on the question of the sufficiency of the evidence is that appellee's loss of time was due to disease, and not to an injury within the terms of the contract. We hold that the policy in suit was an insurance against loss of business time by disease, provided that the disability was proximately caused by a bodily injury occasioned through external, violent, and accidental means. It is the general understanding that this class of policies insure against diseases so occasioned, and where medical science reveals the fact that back of the disease stands a proximate cause answering in all respects to the terms of the policy, it will not suffice to discharge the company that the consequence is accounted a disease. The insured cannot know what may befall him as the result of possible injuries, and it must be taken to have been the understanding of the parties that loss of time occasioned by disease was insured against, where the disability was proximately occasioned by an injury within the provisions of the contract. It will be time enough to deal with the difficult cases suggested by appellant's counsel, involving subtle, external causes of disease, when they arise. There was no evidence tending to show that the inflammation from which appellee suffered was due to any cause other than that of the long-continuing force exerted by the weight of the head. It was said in McCarthy v. Travelers' Ins. Co., 8 Biss. 362, Fed. Cas. No. 8,682, that “an efficient and adequate cause, being found, must be deemed the true cause, unless some other cause, not incidental to it, but independent of it, is shown to have intervened between it and the result.” See, also, Continental Casualty Co. v. Lloyd (at last term), 73 N. E. 824;National Benefit Ass'n v. Grauman, 107 Ind. 288, 7 N. E. 233. It was declared by this court, in Supreme Council, etc., v. Garrigus, 104 Ind. 133, 3 N. E. 818, 54 Am. Rep. 298, that the word “accident,” as used in an accident policy, “should be given its ordinary and usual signification, as being an event that takes place without one's foresight or expectation.” We are not here called on to consider a case where the result is one which follows from ordinary means voluntarily employed, and in which the only element of unexpectedness lies in the fact that the pursuit of the means unexpectedly brings about a physical condition which makes disease possible. Here the element of volition was wholly absent, and the fact that during a period of unconsciousness there was a distinct and long-continued force applied, which compressed the tissues and blood vessels surrounding the bones, and thereby caused the inflammation, marks the case as one of accident.

We are also of opinion that the injury was a violent one within the terms of the policy. The degree of violence is not always a controlling consideration. Southard v. Railway, etc., Co., 34 Conn. 574, Fed. Cas. No. 13,182. We are not to be understood as holding that violence will be wholly implied to bring an accident within the terms of the policy. Our holding is that, where an injury proximately proceeds from a cause which falls within the limitations of the policy interpreted according to the ordinary understanding of the force of words, that interpretation is to be preferred, rather than one which would defeat the protection of the assured in a large class of cases. Trew v. Insurance Co., 6 Hurl. & N. 844; Paul v. Travelers' Ins. Co., 112 N. Y. 472, 20 N. E. 347, 3 L. R. A. 443, 8 Am. St. Rep. 758;Healey v. Mutual Accident Ass'n, 133...