Court Opinion

ID: 9696648
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-25 18:53:51.873455+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T18:20:24.797480
License: Public Domain

Black, J.
(dissenting). Where as here we are given a choice between 2 competing and possibly divergent lines of authority, one humane and the other callous, the choice is easy for me. Note how the Wilson Case (Wilson v. Hartford Livestock Insurance Co. [CCA 5], 193 F2d 752), relied upon by Justice Kelly as authority for affirmance, was considered in the presently quoted Butler Case.
This is a chancery case. We hear it de novo. I am convinced, as the chancellor said he was by “that *416preponderance of evidence,” that the horse should have been destroyed “for humane reasons.”* I am convinced also, as the chancellor said he was not, that the defendant’s refusal to consent to destruction was done simply to avoid liability for heartlessly assigned reasons furnished by hired witnesses. The chancellor’s aforesaid finding that the horse should have been destroyed, “for humane reasons,” is legally akin to the jury’s finding in the Butter Case. That finding calls for a decree granting rather than, denying relief to plaintiff.
See annotation, “Animal or livestock insurance: risks and losses covered,” 29 ALR2d 790, and Butler v. Hartford Live Stock Insurance Co. (1961), 261 Minn 293 (112 NW2d 50). The following quotation from Butler is applicable here. I would apply it accordingly (p 298; pp 53, 54 NR citation):
“While a policy of the kind involved here does not permit destruction of an animal without the consent of the company, except for a fracture as set forth in the policy, the consent cannot be withheld arbitrarily and destruction without consent will not preclude recovery where a jury finds that the animal’s suffering had become so great that it would have been inhumane to permit it to live. See Rosen v. Underwriters at Lloyd’s of London (ED Pa), 100 F Supp 825. Where there is time, of course, the insurer must be given an opportunity, as it was here, to inspect the animal and either give or withhold its consent. But irrespective of whether the company had an opportunity to inspect, if the jury finds destruction was necessary as a humane act, the failure to consent is arbitrary and will not be a bar to recovery.”
To adopt Butler’s rule is to discourage inhumanity. That is enough to direct our course. I would *417reverse and remand for entry of decree in accordance with, the prayer of plaintiff’s bill. Plaintiff should have costs.
Kavanagh, C. J., concurred with Black, J.
Adams, J., took no part in the decision of this case.

APPENDIX

(Quotation of complete conclusion of Judge Pig-gins’ opinion)
“Frankly, this court is perhaps more impressed with the testimony of the experts offered here by the plaintiff than by the defendant, and as I have already pointed out, if the question were only ‘has the plaintiff sustained the burden of proof in establishing that this animal should be destroyed for humane reasons’, the court would be inclined to agree with the plaintiff. I am putting that statement in here for reasons which may be necessary for both counsel in the event an appeal is considered, because I don’t think that is the real issue. Even though plaintiff has sustained that preponderance of evidence, it does not relate to the principal issue. This court cannot' in good conscience say that the defendant ' insurance company has acted arbitrarily. It dispatched 2 veterinarians to examine the horse, it dispatched its field manager or special agent to look at the horse, to investigate, took movies of the horse in action. It seems to this court that although these medical experts differ and although this court might be inclined and would be inclined to lean toward the testimony of the plaintiff’s medical experts, it still presents a question upon which reasonable minds might differ and it still creates a bona fide dispute.
■ “Under the law this court has no alternative, as a result of making that finding, but to deny plaintiff’s request for relief, and a decree may be so entered.”

 See appendix for pertinent and connected quotation of the chan■cellof’s opinion.