Page:North Dakota Reports (vol. 48).pdf/338

 clearly tends to show that the insured took his life while not in the possession of his mental faculties, and when they were disordered, and thus his mind was unsound and not in a condition to reason; in other words, he was then violently insane.

Further proof of insanity is afforded by the physical facts, for it would appear to a reasonable mind that no person possessed of any reason, or, in other words, unless wholly insane, could terminate his own life in such a cruel, inhuman, and fiendish manner. The testimony shows that the body was found on one side of one of the rails of the railroad, and the head on the other side of it, indicating that,if he committed suicide, he placed his body in such position on the rail that the wheels of one of the trucks of a car, which was part of a moving train, would pass over his neck, and thus sever the head from the body, which was virtually what happened. It may also be noted that the defendant, in attempting to prove the by-law, in effect conceded the insanity.

We are of the opinion that the evidence is in such state as to show that the insured at the time he destroyed his own life was so insane as not to comprehend the nature of the act or of the physical result which would flow from it, and for this reason his suicide was caused by accidental means within the meaning of this policy, insuring against bodily injuries from external, violent, and accidental means. Tuttle v. Iowa State Traveling Men’s Association, 132 Iowa, 652, 104 N. W. 1131,7 L. R.A. (N. S.) 223; Accident Ins. Co. v. Crandal, 120 U. S. 527, 7 Sup. Ct: 685, 30 L. ed. 740; Blackstone v. Standard Life Accident Ins. Co., 74 Mich. 592; 42 N. W. 156, 3 L. R. A. 486; Grand Lodge, I. O. M. A., v. Wieting, 168 Ill. 408, 48 N. E. 59, 61 Am. St. Rep. 123.

Here we will consider another important feature of this case. Dr. C. A. Campbell, a duly licensed and practicing physician of Ashley, N. D., the village where the accident happened, testified as a witness on behalf of plaintiff. The evidence shows he examined the dead body of Fred J. Bodman. In addition to other testimony, he stated that the jaw was broken, and that there were several contusions and bruises on one side of the face; that the angle of the right lower jaw was broken. His further testimony, in the form of questions and answers, is as follows:

“Q. From the position that you saw the head, and from its location adjacent to the rail, what would you say caused the fracture of the jaw? A. I couldn’t say, except that the jaw had been hit.

“Q. Might not that have happened by the pressing down of the