In re Estate of Paul

Claimants filed a claim for $2,210 for room and board furnished the decedent herein during one year and ten months immediately preceding his death on July 24, 1938. The administrator resisted the claim. Trial was had resulting [231 Iowa Page 1079] in a verdict in favor of claimants in the sum of $1,250. Judgment was entered accordingly. Claimants then made application for an order to require the administrator to pay the judgment. The administrator resisted the application, asserting that he had collected $4,192.06 from the New York Life Insurance Company on a policy of life insurance, from which he had paid medical and funeral bills and court costs; that decedent left surviving him as his only heir his son, 20 years of age at the time of death, and the balance of the insurance proceeds were not available to pay claimants' judgment. The son of the decedent filed a petition of intervention which adopted the pleadings of the administrator, asserted that the intervener was entitled to the insurance proceeds, prayed that the application of claimants be dismissed and that intervener be awarded the insurance proceeds. The claimants replied to such contentions by asserting that in December 1937, demand was made for payment of board, room, and care then being furnished decedent, decedent had the designation of beneficiary in said life insurance policy changed from his son to his estate, delivered the policy to F.B. Steele, advised him that the policy had been orally assigned to claimants, and instructed Steele that he was to hold the policy until time of death, when the proceeds thereof were to be applied to the amount of indebtedness then due claimants; claimants knew of the arrangement, agreed to it, relied upon it, and are entitled to enforce it.