The Topeka state journal. [volume] (Topeka, Kansas) 1892-1980, 1900-01-25
WAS He INSANE?
That Question Involved in Suit
For Insurance Money.
Joseph hurry Killed Himself
After Shooting His Wife.
WOMAN RECOVERED.
Now She Is Trying to Collect
the Insurance.
X. and L. of S. Claim hurry
Was Not Crazy.
WOMAN RECOVERED.

Because her husband chose the suicide
route for leaving this earth instead OF
waiting for the smallpox, or grip, or
some other malady to take him away
Mrs. Anna NJ hurry. of Parkdale, is
today suing the Knights and Ladies of
Security for $1,000, the amount Of the
policy which Mr.. hurry carried in
that order.
Joseph hurry was the man who shot
himself at his home at 400 Lafayette
street in Parkdale last June, after at
tempting to kill his wife. He was suffer
ing from the effects of a spree at the
time
Fourteen months previous to his sui
eide Mr.. hurry had joined the Knights
and Ladies of Security and had taken
out an insurance policy for $2,OOO- Ihere
was a. clause in his policy which pro-
Vided that if he should commit SUICIDE
within two years the policy should be
void. On account of this clause the ofh-
GERS of the order refused to pay Mrs.
hurry the insurance and she brought
suit for the amount The trial of the
case was begun in the district court
yesterday afternoon
The claim set up by Isenhart & Alex
ander, the attorneys for Mrs. hurry, IS
that hurry was insane at the time of
his suicide. The defense, which is rep
resented by David Overmyer and G.. a.
Huron, claims that hurry was only in
IOAlcaLGQ Wnen ne the uEGus
and that under the provisions of the
policy the order is not liable for in
surance-
DR.. H. A. Warner, medical director of
the order, says that the suicide clause
was not formerly placed in the policies
of the order, but a man was once in
sured who committed suicide Is days af-
ter he received his policy and since that
time the clause has been inserted to
provide against such things.
Men who commit suicide just after
getting their lives insured are generally
men who have become badly involved ="
said DR.. Warner. They wish to leave
their families in as comfortable a cOndi-
ton as possible, so they insure their
lives as heavily as possible and then
commit the deed. For example, there
was a case in New York some time ago
where a man insured his life in different
companies for $500. 000 1t required sew
eral months to get all the policies, but
a few days after getting the last one he
killed himself. He had been wealthy
but had lost his money, and he wished
his family to have all the advantages
to which they had been accustomed.
The courts pronounced the insurance
fraudulent"
In TELLING of the care which fraternal
orders are compelled to exercise in
paying death losses where there is any
mystery about the death of the insured,
DR.. Warner narrates a peculiar story
concerning a Marysville man:
James Scott, of MarysviAe, carried
$4,000 insurance in the Knights and
Ladies of Security. During the first
week in January of last year he went to
St Joseph, and two days afterwards he
disappeared and for months his wife
heard nothing of him. Finally she made
up her mind that he must be dead, and
she wrote to the officers of the order in
Topeka, asking how long she would
have to keep up the payments on her
husbands policy before she could col
lect his insurance. The officers replied
that if she would produce proof of his
death she could secure the insurance
at once, but otherwise she could not
get it at all. A few days later she went
down to Wathena, DOniphan county,
had the body of a Missouri river float
err exhumed, took it to Marysville. and
made proof of death on it. The body
had been discovered in June and buried
by the coroner of Doniphan county as
unknown" and it was August before
Mrs. Scott learned of it and secured
the body.
The officers of the Knights and La
dies of Security doubted the identity of
the body and they set to work to find
out the truth about it. Mrs. SCOTS
brother was not sure enough of it that
he would make an affidavit that it was
the body of Scott.
Mrs. Scott described infinitely the
clothing he had on, telling that he had