in reference thereto explained and submitted to the jury."

Counsel preferred 11 written requests to charge. These were not given except as covered by the general charge. Many of these requests related to the rights and duties of the finder of lost property. We quote two of them:

"9. If you find that these tires were located on land on which the respondent had a lease and a right of possession and a right of use, then I charge you that the respondent had the right to remove the tires from such lands of his and that he had no duty to inquire or search for the owner in any way, and that in so removing said tires it was proper for him to store and preserve them either on his own property or by an arrangement with others, and that such storing and preserving of such property is no evidence of a larceny but is the carrying out of the honest duty of the respondent.

"10. I charge you that if the respondent found these tires on lands which he had the right to occupy, then in moving the tires from said land and preserving them at some other place, he was but acting within his rights and he had no duty to make inquiry of the Grand Trunk or anybody else as to the ownership of the tires."

Whatever may be the decisions in other commonwealths these requests to charge were not correct statements of the law in this State. See chapter 141, 2 Comp. Laws 1915, and especially sections 7446 and 7450.

The charge was a very long one. statements the jury was told:

Among other

"Now, such intent, if he found them as he claims, you would have to find was formed by him at the time he first removed them, not afterwards. If his purpose in removing them from the pit, when he first found them, was to remove them from the pit and convert to his own use and deprive the owner of them

217 Mich.-2.

permanently then he had a felonious intent.

But if

he removed them from the pit for the purpose of preserving them, so the owner might have them later, and later on formed the purpose of stealing them, he would not be guilty of the crime of larceny.

"Now, that may sound very fine drawn to some of you people, but that is the law, because under our statute, if the finder of property takes no steps as pointed out in the statute to give notice to the owner or to find the owner, and after finding and having the property in his possession forms the intent to convert it to his own use, he is guilty of another offense but not of larceny. * * *

"Now the mere fact that he did not report it to the police or that he did not advertise it does not make him guilty of the crime here charged, but what he did and what a person of average intelligence and right thinking would have done under the same circumstances, may be considered by you upon the question of his intent. He says he took the automobile tires and stored them and he tells you where they were placed. What was his purpose? A man under the circumstances here disclosed by the testimony and the respondent might take the automobile tires and store them, holding them for the owner. When he removed them from where he says he found them, what was his purpose? Was it to hold them for the owner or to deprive the owner of them and take them himself? If his purpose was to hold them for the owner and he had nothing to do with placing them in the pit where he found them, then he would not be guilty of any larceny, but if at the time he found them or at the time he removed them from the place where he found them, his purpose was to convert them to his own use and deprive the owner thereof permanently, whoever the owner might be, then he would be guilty of larceny provided you find that these tires were part of the shipment from Detroit. * * *

"He claims that the tires in court, 16 tires here were found by him on his ground in that pit, along the last of January or the first of February, 1920. Now, if he so found them, those tires are no part of the shipment made from Detroit on the 26th day of February. 1920. I am calling your attention to these

*

*

matters because of the issue of fact to be decided by you from the evidence. If you find that the tires here in court were in the possession of the respondent previous to their shipment from Detroit, or the time they could have reached the city of Lansing, then your verdict must be not guilty."

So far as

The case was carefully and ably tried. the requests of counsel were proper to be given to the jury, they were fully covered by the general charge. The jury simply did not believe the story of the defendant.

The conviction is affirmed, and the case is remanded for further proceedings.

STEERE, C. J., and CLARK, BIRD, and SHARPE, JJ., concurred. MOORE, WIEST, and FELLOWS, JJ., did not sit.

SULLIVAN v. LADIES CATHOLIC BENEVOLENT ASS'N.

INSURANCE-BENEFICIAL ASSOCIATIONS-SUSPENDED MEMBERS-RE INSTATEMENT-CONFLICT IN SUPREME AND LOCAL CONSTITUTIONS. In view of a provision of the constitution of the supreme council of a beneficial association giving a suspended member three months in which to make payment of arrearage of assessments and dues, in addition to a small fine, without requiring a health certificate, and making it the duty of the president of the local branch, at a regular meeting thereof, to reinstate any suspended member making such payment, a suspended member whose dues and assessments were paid to the secretary of the

local branch within 15 days after they became due, which were retained until the time of the trial, was reinstated and her policy valid, although the local branch had not met and acted on her reinstatement at the time of her death; a provision of the constitution of the local branch limiting the time and place of payment to regular meeting nights of the local branch being immaterial, especially in view of the fact that the provisions of the local constitution were often disregarded, and, if strictly enforced, I would be in conflict with the constitution of the supreme council.

Error to Kent; Brown (William B.), J.

October 21, 1921.

cember 21, 1921.

(Docket No. 107.)

Submitted Decided De

Assumpsit by Abbie Wernette Sullivan against the Ladies Catholic Benevolent Association for the amount of a benefit certificate. Judgment for defendant. Plaintiff brings error. Reversed.

Grant Sims, for appellant.

J. T. & T. F. McAllister, for appellee.

MOORE, J. This is an action brought by the plaintiff against the defendant to recover the sum of $1,000 claimed to be due to the plaintiff under a beneficiary certificate issued by the defendant to her mother, Elizabeth W. Boody. The case was tried before the judge without a jury. The court found the deceased had failed to pay her benefit assessment in accordance with the constitution and by-laws, and died while so suspended, and rendered a judgment in favor of the defendant. The case is brought here by writ of

error.

The defendant on April 27, 1915, issued to Elizabeth W. Boody, as a member of St. Mary's branch, located at Grand Rapids, a beneficiary certificate for the sum of $1,000 and the plaintiff, her daughter

Abbie Wernette Sullivan, was the beneficiary. This certificate provided that the certificate, the charter, the articles of incorporation, the constitution and bylaws, the application and medical examination signed by her, should constitute the agreement. That part of the constitution which applies to this case and which became part of the contract is as follows:

"Constitution of the Supreme Council.

"SECTION 15. Every member of this department must pay to the beneficiary fund in her branch the amount of her assessment on or before the last day of each month. Then if said assessment shall not have been paid before, but shall remain unpaid at the time of the first regular branch meeting after the expiration of the month, such members who fail to pay the assessment are by their own neglect hereby declared to be suspended and to have suspended themselves, by their own act from all right in the association, and should they die while under such suspension, they shall not be entitled to the beneficiary. member suspended for the nonpayment of assessment, and remaining suspended during the period of three months or less, shall be reinstated by the branch president, at a regular meeting of the branch from which she is suspended, when said suspended member shall have paid all assessments and monthly dues due at the time of her suspension, and from the date of her suspension to the date of her reinstatement, and in addition thereto a fine not exceeding twentyfive cents." * * *

Any

Section 158 of the constitution of the local branch provides:

"SEC. 158. Applications for membership, reports of trustees on the fitness of applicants, balloting and initiations, transfers, suspensions and expulsions and like orders of business shall never be acted upon except at regular meetings."

Section 227 of the constitution of the local branch reads in part: