Court Opinion

ID: 9827734
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-09-01 17:48:37.730617+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T07:42:35.530419
License: Public Domain

On Motion for Rehearing.
Appellant earnestly insists that we erred on original hearing in overruling its assignment of error presenting the contention that Issue No. 1 submitted to the jury should be condemned as multifarious. The proposition in appellant’s brief presenting that contention reads as follows:
“An issue which submitted to the jury the question as to whether plaintiff was totally disabled solely from the injury complained of, and at once and continuously after the occurrence of the same, and for any period of time, was a multifarious issue and should not have been given over defendant’s objection on such ground.”
Article 2189, Rev. Civ. Statutes 1925, provides that each separate issue of fact relied on by plaintiff as a basis for recovery, and essential to his right of recovery, must be submitted to the jury separately from all others. The purpose of that rule is to insure findings on all such necessary issues of fact.
From a reading of appellant’s propositions quoted above, it will be observed that no contention was made that the issue whether or not plaintiff sustained the injury complained of and the further issue whether he was thereafter disabled from performing the duties of his occupation should have been submitted as controverted issues separately from all others. The proposition assumes that the injury was in fact sustained and that disability followed. The grounds of objection urged in the proposition are that it included three separate issues of fact, which are, in substance, as follows:
First. Whether plaintiff’s disability was due solely to the injury complained of.
Second. Whether such disability occurred immediately after the injury and continued without cessation.
Third. Whether he was totally disabled.
There can be no doubt that the jury’s answer to issue No. I included a finding of total disability resulting solely from the injury and continuing for some period of time not stated. Any possible doubt on that point is removed by the finding on the next issue, No. 2, which specifically refers to issue No. T. The finding on issue No. 2 necessarily implies a further finding that there was a total disability resulting solely 'from the injury, and it specifically stated that such disability began immediately after the injury was sustained and continued without cessation for twenty-nine weeks from and after that time. The finding in answer to issue No. 3 was specific that, as a result of the injury, plaintiff suffered partial disability; and the finding in answer to issue No. 4 was that such partial disability continued without cessation from July 16, 1926, to May 18, 1928, and, especially when read in the light of the preceding issues, as the jury must have done, those findings imply that such partial disability resulted solely from the injury.
 It thus appears that there were separate and distinct findings by the jury on each and all of the controverted issues of fact included in issue No. 1; and thus the purpose of the requirement of the statute for the submission of all material issues of fact ¡separately from each other was fully accomplished. It is a familiar rule that, in testing the correctness of the court’s instructions to the jury, the entire charge may be looked to.
It will be noted that the issue of waiver of the necessity of proofs of loss was not submitted to the jui-y. It also appears that, in the conclusions filed by the trial judge, there was no specific finding of such waiver. Appellant insists that the evidence conclusively shows that plaintiff did not make proofs of loss within ninety days from the termination of the respective periods for which the company was liable, and especially for the period following June 2, 1926; the policy containing a provision for a weekly accident indemnity of $37.50. As pointed out in the opinion on original hearing, the plaintiff made four proofs of loss which at all *1001events were witMn tlie required time to entitle plaintiff to the respective weekly indemnities up to the date of the last proof, which was on June 2, 1926. But no further proofs were submitted as a basis for his claim for indemnity from and after.that date and up to May 18, 1928. Since the plaintiff specially pleaded defendant’s waiver of proof, the finding of the court that plaintiff furnished to the defendant all proofs of loss required by the terms of the policy must be construed as intended to mean that, by reason of the defendant’s denial of liability, plaintiff was not required to furnish any further proofs of loss than those that were furnished. It would be unreasonable to infer that the trial court meant to find that further proofs were made after June 2, 1926, in the absence of any testimony whatever to support such a finding.
The refusals of the defendant to pay plaintiff any indemnity after its receipt of the several different proofs submitted to it by the plaintiff, without any denial by the defendant of the receipt of such proofs, and without any reason or explanation given for such refusal, was. equivalent to a denial of liability, and' such repudiation of liability was a waiver of any right defendant otherwise would have had to require further proofs. It therefore follows that the facts found by the trial judge established such waiver, and, with respect to that issue, the judgment of the trial court should be sustained, notwithstanding the absence of further proofs of loss than those furnished by the plaintiff, and notwithstanding the absence of any specific finding of waiver by the trial court. It is a familiar rule that a judgment may be sustained on other grounds than that upon which it is based, provided such grounds are conclusively established.
The appellant’s motion for rehearing is overruled.