Southern Life & Health Insurance Co. v. Simon

411 S.W.2d 765, 1967 Tex. App. LEXIS 2362
CourtCourt of Appeals of Texas
DecidedFebruary 2, 1967
DocketNo. 6846
StatusPublished
Cited by2 cases

This text of 411 S.W.2d 765 (Southern Life & Health Insurance Co. v. Simon) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering Court of Appeals of Texas primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
Southern Life & Health Insurance Co. v. Simon, 411 S.W.2d 765, 1967 Tex. App. LEXIS 2362 (Tex. Ct. App. 1967).

Opinion

PARKER, Justice.

Southern Life and Health Insurance Company issued a “Limited Accident Industrial Policy” to Austin Chevis (with his wife Merla Mae Chevis named as beneficiary). Chevis was accidentally killed. Merla Mae Chevis Simon (widow of the insured) and her husband, Joseph Simon, Jr., sued the insurance company to recover for the accidental death of the insured under the policy. The trial was before the court without a jury. Judgment was rendered for the full death indemnity provided by the policy, together with statutory penalty, interest and attorney’s fees. The insurance company in its appeal does not contest the award of interest, damages, statutory penalty and attorney’s fees if its primary liability under the policy is affirmed.

The policy itself provides:

“2. Or if the Insured shall by -collision of or any accident to any railroad passenger car, passenger steamship, public omnibus, street railway car, public taxicab, public automobile, public stage or public bus which is being driven or operated at the time by one regularly employed for that purpose, and inside of which the Insured is legally traveling; any private horse drawn vehicle or private motor driven automobile, inside of which the Insured is riding or driving, or any motor driven truck, inside of which the Insured is riding or driving, or if a street car motorman or street car conductor in addition to being cove(pd as an individual by all the above provisions of the Policy he shall also be covered, while actually operating a street car in the line of his employment when injured by collision of or accident to the street car which he is operating; or by any accident to any passenger-elevator, inside of which the Insured is riding as a passenger; provided, that in all cases referred to in this paragraph there shall be some external or visible injury on the said vehicle or elevator of the collision, or accident, provided that an injury to the tire on such vehicle shall not be considered an injury to the vehicle, and provided that this Policy does not cover Insured while riding in or on a motorcycle or in or on any side car or other attachment to a motorcycle — and provided that except as to railroad passenger cars, passenger steamships, street cars and elevators the collision or accident must occur on a public highway as heretofore defined.
“3. Should the Insured suffer any of the specific losses set forth below, the Company will pay the sum opposite such loss, and such payment shall be a full settlement under this Policy, which shall be delivered up for cancellation.

[767]*767In the early morning of February 27, 1962, the longshoreman Austin Chevis was fatally injured on the “SS Lena Lucken-bach”. According to the Coast Guard Inspection Certificate the “Luckenbach” is certified to carry 12 passengers. Her passenger accommodations consist of 6 cabins, each equipped with private bathroom facilities with 2 pull-down bunks that serve as seats in the daytime and make into beds at night. The ship has a passenger lounge. The passengers eat their meals with the officers in the saloon messroom. Some recreational facilities are provided for the passengers. When she was in the inter-' coastal run and up until May of 1961 she always carried from 4 to 12 passengers. When the accident occurred there were no passengers aboard but all of the ship’s facilities for carrying passengers were intact and ready to receive passengers at that time. The charter party under which the vessel was then being operated had the right to carry passengers. The insurance company does not controvert that the “Luckenbach” “was equipped to be a passenger steamship” or that “she had been a passenger steamship” but does assign as error the court’s finding that she “was a passenger steamship”. This contention of the insurance company is based upon the fact that at the time of this accident the steamship was operating only as a freighter. No Texas authorities are cited by the insurance company in support of its contention. In Continental Cas. Co. v. Warren, 152 Tex. 164, 254 S.W.2d 762

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Related

New York Underwriters Insurance Co. v. Coffman
540 S.W.2d 445 (Court of Appeals of Texas, 1976)
Southern Life & Health Insurance Co. v. Simon
416 S.W.2d 793 (Texas Supreme Court, 1967)

Cite This Page — Counsel Stack

Bluebook (online)
411 S.W.2d 765, 1967 Tex. App. LEXIS 2362, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/southern-life-health-insurance-co-v-simon-texapp-1967.