S & M Lamp Co. v. Lumbermens Mutual Casualty Co.

The defendant has appealed from a judgment rendered against it in an action upon a policy of fidelity insurance. The trial court found that “on or about the weekend of July 4, 1957, Ben Stevens and Eugene Stevens, who were then in the employment of plaintiff,’’ appropriated to themselves certain items of the plaintiff’s personal property without its consent. While the loss was alleged to be in the amount of $7,500, recovery was allowed only with respect to certain of the articles alleged to have been taken and the judgment was for the sum of $3,483.

With respect to any matter of fact upon which the trial court’s determination rests, this court must view the evidence and the inferences which find reasonable support therein in the light most favorable to the plaintiff as the prevailing party in the court below. The facts which must be considered in the disposition of this appeal will be stated in that light.

In 1956, two brothers, Ben and Eugene Stevens, and their nephew, K. R. Corbin, were associated together as partners in a foundry business in Gilroy, California. In the latter part of that year, they sold a quantity of items of foundry equipment and machinery to the plaintiff.…