George E. Bayer v. American Mutual

During the year 1950 and for a period of time thereafter George E. Bayer and John Markle were partners in conducting a mutual
insurance agency in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. In 1950 they invested certain funds in the Merchants Mutual Casualty Company
of Kansas City, Missouri. (The name of this company was later changed to American Mutual Casualty Company.) The transactions
of plaintiffs with Merchants and the other defendants will be hereinafter more fully described. In 1955 Bayer and Markle filed this suit in which they alleged that their investment in Merchants was made as the result
of certain false and fraudulent representations on the part of a number of the defendants. In the first count of their petition
they sought to recover $22,150 actual and $150,000 punitive damages and in the second count they prayed for actual damages
in the sum of $300,000. George Bayer died in January 1957, but prior thereto, on December 1, 1956, he assigned all of his
interest in the claims alleged in the petition herein to John Markle. (We will, however, continue to refer to Bayer and Markle
as plaintiffs in referring to events occurring prior to the trial of this case.) At the close of plaintiff's evidence the
motions of all defendants for directed verdicts were sustained and, in response to the direction of the court, the jury returned
a verdict in favor of all the defendants. Plaintiff has duly appealed from the ensuing judgment.