Ziolkowski v. Continental Casualty Co.

270 Ill. App. 286, 1933 Ill. App. LEXIS 524
CourtAppellate Court of Illinois
DecidedApril 11, 1933
DocketGen. No. 36,226
StatusPublished
Cited by4 cases

This text of 270 Ill. App. 286 (Ziolkowski v. Continental Casualty Co.) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering Appellate Court of Illinois primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
Ziolkowski v. Continental Casualty Co., 270 Ill. App. 286, 1933 Ill. App. LEXIS 524 (Ill. Ct. App. 1933).

Opinion

Mr. Presiding Justice Soanlan

delivered the opinion of the court.

Plaintiff sued defendant in assumpsit as beneficiary under an accident insurance policy issued by defendant to one Joseph Sarnoüski. The case was tried by the court, without a jury, and the issues were found for plaintiff and damages were assessed in the sum of $2,645. Defendant has appealed from a judgment entered upon the finding.

The declaration consisted of one count and contained a copy of the contract of insurance. Defendant filed a plea of the general issue and two special pleas, the first special plea alleging “that the injury causing the loss of life of insured resulted from an intentional act of insured or some other person”; and the second alleging “that the injury causing the loss of life of insured resulted from an intentional act of another person, to-wit, a stab wound, which assault was not committed upon the assured by such other person for the sole purpose of burglary or robbery and which assault was not incurred by insured while engaged in the proper performance of the duties of his occupation and provoked solely thereby, ’ ’ etc. Plaintiff filed replications to the two special pleas. This was the second trial of the cause. In the first there was a finding and judgment in favor of plaintiff and upon appeal to this court we reversed the judgment and remanded the cause. (See Ziolkowski v. Continental Casualty Co., 263 Ill. App. 31.)

The part of the policy upon which defendant relies for its defense reads as follows: “Part V. Not Covered. This policy does not cover any loss . . . (3) if the injury causing it results from the intentional act of the Insured or of any other person excepting, however, assaults committed upon the Insured for the sole purpose of burglary or robbery and also excepting assaults incurred by the Insured while engaged in the proper performance of the duties of his occupation and provoked solely thereby. . . .” Upon the trial plaintiff introduced in evidence a stipulation of facts, which will be found «in our former opinion, the contract of insurance and a letter sent to plaintiff’s attorney by defendant company, which will also be found in our former opinion. Plaintiff then rested. Defendant offered in evidence an affidavit of one Peter Kulik, which will be found in our former opinion, and which was part of the proof submitted to defendant by plaintiff in support of his claim. Defendant, in the instant trial, also introduced the following evidence which was not offered in the first trial: Vincent Starybrat testified that at the time in question he was on a northbound street car and when it reached the corner of 84th and Burley he “saw two Mexican fellows” running east on Buffalo avenue, and that as soon as the car “got between Buffalo avenue and Burley avenue about 100 feet from the corner I seen a man laying on the ground between the sidewalk and the curbstone. I got off the car and went to help the man. As soon as I do that, a fellow, a Mexican, right by my garage ran away, and there was another one had a hatchet and one a big pipe. They were going after that man. That man that run away took a bunch of -bricks-and throw them through the window. The Mexican threw the bricks through the restaurant window and at that time a man was lying on the ground there. This restaurant is about 100 feet from the corner of Burley and 84th. The next thing I did was to run away from there. I went upstairs in garage and called up the station. I saw three Mexicans. One stayed on southwest corner and pointed to these two fellows what to do. They were throwing bricks and rocks and everything through the window in the restaurant. I did not observe as to what was done to the man who was lying on the street. I heard him scream, that is all. ’ ’ Walter Puchalski testified that he recalled when Joseph Sarnouski was stabbed by a Mexican; that he then had charge of his brother’s restaurant at 3245 East 84th street, between Burley and Buffalo avenues; that there were about four people in the restaurant at the time; that one of them was Casmer Pryzbylsld, a Polish fellow; that Joseph Sarnouski and Peter Kulik were not in there at any time; that Pryzbylsld was looking out of the window and called to the witness to come down, “that someone was chasing them outside. I went to the window and saw a lad fall down right in front of the place right off the sidewalk. This was Peter Kulik. I did not see anyone else on the street just then. Later saw a man in the same place. Pryzbylski and I walked out and brought this lad Kulik in. After we brought him in there was a bunch of house bricks come flying through the window of the store. Sarnouski had fallen down almost in the same place Kulik did. I didn’t see Sarnouski fall down. Mexicans threw the bricks through the restaurant window. Kulik and Pryzbylski were of Polish extraction.” Dennis O’Keefe, a police officer whose beat was in the neighborhood in question, testified that it was made up “mostly of Polish and there were quite a number of Mexican families that had moved in there. I had occasion to go to 84th and Burley along about midnight, February 30th, with reference to the stabbing of Joseph Sarnouski. I got there shortly before midnight. I was informed at the station that there was trouble there earlier in the evening. When I got there I found a man lying on the street in front of a sandwich shop and another man lying behind the counter in the same shop. The man lying behind the counter was Peter Kulik and the man in the street was Joseph Sarnouski. I had them moved to a hospital. ’ ’

The court found, as a fact, “that the assault upon insured which resulted in his death was not incurred by insured while engaged in the proper performance of the duties of his occupation and provoked solely thereby,” and plaintiff does not question this finding. It is conceded, of course, that the assault was not committed for the sole purpose of burglary. Defendant contends that the undisputed evidence establishes that the act of the Mexican who stabbed Sarnouski was intentional, and that the evidence also establishes that the assault and killing was not for the sole purpose of robbery, and that Part V of the policy does not cover a loss of life under such a state of facts. Plaintiff contends that “the assault was not intentional within the meaning of the word (intentional) as used in insurance policies,” and further that “the defendant did not prove that the assault, even if an intentional act, was not for the sole purpose of robbery.” Plaintiff argues that “in the case at bar it is admitted that the assured did not know the Mexicans. Under the foregoing authority (Mah See v. North American Acc. Ins. Co., 190 Cal. 421, 213 Pac. 42), if the Mexicans mistook the insured to have been a participant in the affair early in the evening, plaintiff would still be entitled to recover. Furthermore, it was incumbent upon defendant to prove the Mexicans actually intended to kill the insured. . . . Even assuming, for the purposes of argument, that the Mexicans were looking for some one who participated in the melee earlier in the day— and came upon the insured — an assault under the mistaken impression that the insured had participated in the earlier affair would not defeat recovery under the policy. ” Defendant argues that “the fact that insured and Kulik did not know the Mexicans would make no difference if the act of stabbing was an intentional act of the Mexican. All that was necessary for defendant to prove under the allegations in the second plea was that the injury which caused the loss of life of insured resulted from the intentional act of another person.

Free access — add to your briefcase to read the full text and ask questions with AI

Related

E. J. Albrecht Co. v. Fidelity & Casualty Co. of New York
7 N.E.2d 626 (Appellate Court of Illinois, 1937)
Ziolkowski v. Continental Casualty Co.
7 N.E.2d 451 (Illinois Supreme Court, 1937)
Ziolkowski v. Continental Casualty Co.
1 N.E.2d 410 (Appellate Court of Illinois, 1936)
Porter v. Continental Casualty Co.
277 Ill. App. 492 (Appellate Court of Illinois, 1934)

Cite This Page — Counsel Stack

Bluebook (online)
270 Ill. App. 286, 1933 Ill. App. LEXIS 524, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/ziolkowski-v-continental-casualty-co-illappct-1933.