Ball v. Marquette Casualty Co.

184 So. 2d 60, 1966 La. App. LEXIS 5292
CourtLouisiana Court of Appeal
DecidedMarch 7, 1966
DocketNo. 1712
StatusPublished
Cited by2 cases

This text of 184 So. 2d 60 (Ball v. Marquette Casualty Co.) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering Louisiana Court of Appeal primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
Ball v. Marquette Casualty Co., 184 So. 2d 60, 1966 La. App. LEXIS 5292 (La. Ct. App. 1966).

Opinion

McBRIDE, Judge.

This matter involves demands for damages arising out of an intersectional automobile collision. Defendants are Marquette Casualty Company, public liability insurer of the car alleged to have caused plaintiffs’ damages, and Clifford Wormser, Sr., individually, and as administrator of the estate of his minor son, Clifford Wormser, Jr., the latter having been the driver of the offending automobile. After a trial in the lower court there was judgment in favor of Marcelle Ball for the sum of $5050, Mrs. Corinne Van Geffen for $450, Mrs. Jacldin Madsen for $500, Ingvald Madsen for $137, and Mrs. Elise Orillion for $500, all of said awards running against the defendants in solido. Mrs. Marcelle Ball also was awarded judgment for $2,450 against Clifford Wormser, Sr., individually and as the administrator of the estate of his minor son, Clifford Wormser, Jr.

Both defendants jointly perfected a sus-pensive and devolutive appeal, each furnishing separate appeal bonds.

The matter was, in due course, assigned for argument in this court at which both appellants were represented by counsel; however, subsequent to argument and submission of this case but before a determination thereof, a judgment was rendered in the matter entitled “Dudley A. Guglielmo, Commissioner of Insurance, State of Louisiana v. Marquette Casualty Company”, No. 104,820 of the Docket of the 19th Judicial District Court in and for the Parish of East Baton Rouge, under R.S. 22:733 and 734, placing Marquette Casualty Company in rehabilitation; Dudley A. Guglielmo, [61]*61Commissioner of Insurance of the State of Louisiana, was named as rehabilitator, and an injunction was issued prohibiting the bringing or further prosecuting of any actions against said Marquette Casualty Company. The Commissioner of Insurance, as rehabilitator of Marquette Casualty Company, filed a motion in this court seeking a stay of all further proceedings in this case as against said company. Accordingly, we followed prior jurisprudence and stayed all proceedings on the appeal insofar as the same affected Marquette Casualty Company. See Benenate v. Brooks, La. App., 95 So.2d 757; Scott v. Baton Rouge Bus Co., La.App., 118 So.2d 486.

We adjudicated the appeal insofar as it affected the other appellant, Clifford Wormser, Sr., individually, and as administrator of the estate of his minor son, Clifford Wormser, Jr. On April 5, 1965, our opinion and decree was handed down which resulted in the judgment in favor of Mrs. Marcelle Ball being increased from $7,500 to $9,581.40 and as thus amended the judgment in favor of Mrs. Ball and in favor of all of the other appellees was affirmed but only as against Clifford Wormser, Sr., individually, and as administrator of the estate of his minor son, Clifford Wormser, Jr., La.App., 176 So.2d 799. After a rehearing our original decree was reinstated. 176 So.2d 803. The Supreme Court denied cer-tiorari. 248 La. 417, 179 So.2d 16.

After dispatching the appeal of Clifford Wormser, Sr., individually, and as administrator of the estate of his minor son, Clifford Wormser, Jr., there was left pending before us the appeal of Marquette Casualty Company in rehabilitation;

On August 16, 1965, the affairs of Marquette Casualty Company passed from rehabilitation to liquidation (see R.S. 22:-736, et seq.) and the 19th Judicial District Court in and for the Parish of East Baton Rouge in the above mentioned rehabilitation proceedings appointed Dudley A. Guglielmo as receiver or liquidator of Marquette Casualty Company. In an order issued by us December 22, 1965, at the behest of plaintiffs herein, we made Dudley A. Gug-lielmo, Insurance Commissioner in his capacity, as receiver of Marquette Casualty Company, a party to this appeal. We now confess that this order was improvident as there is no authority for its issuance, and we now recall it.

The appeal of Marquette Casualty Company taken herein must be dismissed for the good and sufficient reason that there is no appellant before us as Marquette Casualty Company, by virtue of its liquidation under the insurance laws of this state, has passed out of existence, and there is no one who could possibly prosecute the appeal. Peerless Insurance Company, the surety on the appeal bond furnished by Marquette Casualty Company, has made no appearance and is not before us.

Our dismissal of the appeal is made under authority of Levy v. Union Indemnity Co., 146 So. 182, decided by our predecessor, the Court of Appeal for the Parish of Orleans. The situation the court dealt with there was almost identical with that in the instant appeal and what was said in Levy v. Union Indemnity Co., fits the instant case like a glove:

“Attached to said motion for an indefinite continuance we find a verified copy of a petition filed by the receivers of Union Indemnity Company in the receivership proceedings, and a verified copy of an order rendered on that petition. In the petition appears the following :
“ ‘Petitioners have been advised that the legal effect of the receivership was to dissolve defendant company and terminate its corporate existence, but petitioners aver that this legal interpretation should be confirmed by order of this honorable court.’
[62]*62“In the judgment rendered on the said petition, we find the following:
“ ‘It is hereby recognized and declared that defendant, Union Indemnity Company, was dissolved by the proceedings had and the decree of this court,’ etc.
“[1] The order above quoted is, in fact, merely a judicial recognition of a status which already existed, for it is well settled that where, by authority of such a statute as Act No. 105 of 1898, receivers are appointed for an insurance company, the formerly existing corporation is, by the very appointment of receivers, entirely dissolved, and its life is terminated.
“[2] In this regard there is a vast difference between a statutory receivership and an equitable one, in the latter of which the corporation itself continues to exist. In such case appointment of receivers merely deprives the corporation of the right to manage its own affairs, and places in the possession of the receivers the assets of the corporation. But the corporation itself retains its corporate functions, and a suit pending against the corporation may be prosecuted to final judgment, although, of course, execution may not issue against the receivers, and a judgment obtained against the corporation must be presented to the receivers for such action as the court having jurisdiction over the receivership proceedings may determine to be proper. On the other hand, a statutory receivership, such as is contemplated by the statute of 1898, terminates the corporate existence entirely. The distinction between the two kinds of receivership to which we have referred is clearly set forth in Clark on Receivers (2d Ed.) vol. 2, § 703.
“In Pendleton v. Russell, 144 U.S. 640, 12 S.Ct. 743, 745, 36 L.Ed. 574, is found a case in which, during the pendency on appeal of a suit against a life insurance company, that company was placed in the hands of a receiver appointed under a statute in many respects similar to the Louisiana statute of 1898. The Supreme Court of the United States, after stating that no proceeding had been instituted to make the receiver a party to the litigation which was pending at the time of his appointment, said:

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Related

Myles v. Turner
612 So. 2d 32 (Supreme Court of Louisiana, 1993)
Ricard v. Marquette Casualty Co.
184 So. 2d 64 (Louisiana Court of Appeal, 1966)

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Bluebook (online)
184 So. 2d 60, 1966 La. App. LEXIS 5292, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/ball-v-marquette-casualty-co-lactapp-1966.