Atlanta Tallow Co. v. Fireman's Fund Insurance

167 S.E.2d 361, 119 Ga. App. 430, 1969 Ga. App. LEXIS 1128

• Court: Court of Appeals of Georgia
• Decided: March 20, 1969
• Docket: 44208
• Status: Published

Opinions

Deen, Judge.

The insurance policy covered, under Coverage A, loss of money and securities by destruction, disappearance or wrongful abstraction within the premises of the insured mercantile company, and under Coverage B insured against loss of money or securities, by destruction, disappearance or wrongful abstraction outside the premises, subject to the provision that at the time of such destruction, disappearance or wrongful abstraction the property is being conveyed, either by a messenger or an armored vehicle company. No armored car was involved here. A messenger, under the contract definition, means the insured, an officer or partner of the insured, or any “employee in the regular service of and duly authorized by the insured to have the care and custody of the property outside the premises.” It is admitted that the employee, who was engaged in transporting money from the bank to the company premises, was a messenger and duly authorized to have the money in his care and custody. Equally, the majority of this court is of the opinion that it was in fact in the process of being conveyed from the bank to the employer’s premises at the time when the theft occurred, even though the messenger stopped for a 10-minute interval en route (leaving the money in a box in a locked glove compartment within his locked automobile while he went into a restaurant to buy a sandwich) and the automobile was burglarized during his absence. To convey means to carry or transport. Webster, New International Dictionary, 3rd Ed. It cannot reasonably be said that the money was not being transported or carried from the bank to the company premises at the time of the theft, and there is no policy provision which required the automobile to be in actual motion at the time of the disappearance or abstraction of the goods. Neither is there any provision that the money must be carried on the messenger’s person rather than in the vehicle of conveyance. To so limit coverage in the absence of clear and unambiguous policy provisions would be violative of the cardinal rule that insurance policies are to be construed in favor of rather than against the insured. Massachusetts Benefit Life Assn. v. Robinson, 104 Ga. 256 (2) (30 SE 918, 42 LRA 261).

The trial court erred in granting the defendant’s motion for summary judgment.

Judgment reversed.

All the judges concur in the judgment except Eberhardt, J., who dissents. Deen, J., concurs specially, joined by Bell, P. J., Jordan P. J., and Pannell, J. Hall, J., concurs specially, joined by Felton, C. J., and Whitman, J.