Hampton v. Thomas

433 So. 2d 884
CourtLouisiana Court of Appeal
DecidedJune 6, 1983
Docket83-CA-301
StatusPublished
Cited by4 cases

This text of 433 So. 2d 884 (Hampton v. Thomas) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering Louisiana Court of Appeal primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
Hampton v. Thomas, 433 So. 2d 884 (La. Ct. App. 1983).

Opinion

433 So.2d 884 (1983)

Jerry HAMPTON and Patricia Hampton, Individually and on behalf of their minor son, Jay Hampton
v.
William S. THOMAS and State Farm Insurance Company.

No. 83-CA-301.

Court of Appeal of Louisiana, Fifth Circuit.

June 6, 1983.

T. Peter Breslin, Gauthier, Murphy, Sherman, McCabe & Chehardy, Kenner, for plaintiffs-appellants.

Edward P. Lobman, Lobman & Carnahan, Metairie, for defendants-appellees.

Before BOWES, CURRAULT and DUFRESNE, JJ.

CURRAULT, Judge.

This appeal arises from a judgment denying the stacking of insurance coverage for medical payments to plaintiff, Patricia Hampton, under three separate policies of insurance. The insurance on the policies is provided by State Farm Mutual Automobile Insurance Company, defendant herein.

The facts show that appellant-plaintiff, Patricia Hampton, sustained injuries necessitating medical treatment as a result of an automobile accident on February 8, 1980. At the time, she was driving her 1972 Cadillac insured by appellee-defendant, State Farm. The cost of this medical treatment incurred is as reflected in the stipulation presented to the court, Twelve Thousand Four Hundred Fifty-Three and 19/100 Dollars ($12,453.19).

Jerry Hampton, the husband of the injured Patricia Hampton, was the named insured on three separate policies with State Farm Mutual Automobile Insurance Company (State Farm). Each of those policies had medical payments coverage in the amount of Five Thousand Dollars ($5,000).

*885 State Farm has paid the sum of Five Thousand Dollars ($5,000) in medical payments pursuant to the policy insuring a 1972 Cadillac owned by Patricia Hampton and driven by her in the accident.

Plaintiff contends that in light of the two additional policies provided by State Farm to the Hamptons, she is entitled to stack the additional medical payments coverage of $5,000 per policy up to the total sum of Twelve Thousand Four Hundred Fifty-Three and 19/100 Dollars ($12,453.19), (subject, of course, to the $5,000 credit for previous payments).

This matter was tried by way of stipulation on May 21, 1982. On July 26, 1982, judgment was rendered in favor of the defendant and against the plaintiffs. This appeal has been taken from that judgment.

The issues presented to the court are whether stacking of medical payments under three separate policies of insurance is prohibited either by law or by the terms of the insurance contracts in question.

Our research indicates that the jurisprudence cited by the parties and the trial court requires careful scrutiny as there is diversity between Circuits, and no positive statement by either the legislature or the Louisiana Supreme Court. Since the issue is one not addressed by this court previously under these specific facts, a case-by-case analysis follows in order to better determine the issue presented.

Eleven cases have addressed the issue of stacking of medical payments coverages in Louisiana to date. The first opinion was rendered by our brothers in the Third Circuit in Guillory v. Grain Dealers Mutual Insurance Company, 203 So.2d 762 (La.App. 3d Cir.1967). The cases that followed are: Odom v. American Insurance Company, 213 So.2d 359 (La.App. 3d Cir.1968); Easley v. Fireman's Insurance Company of Newark, New Jersey, 372 So.2d 1067 (La.App. 3d Cir.1979); Cole v. State Farm Mut. Auto. Ins. Co., 427 So.2d 522 (La. 3d Cir.1983); Willie Jones v. Allstate Insurance Co., 429 So.2d 241 (La. 3d Cir.1983); Bost v. Hartford Accident and Indemnity, 242 So.2d 355 (La.App. 2d Cir.1970); Owens v. Aetna Casualty and Surety Company, 424 So.2d 359 (La.App. 2d Cir.1982); Bourgeois v. Government Employers Insurance Company, 316 So.2d 804 (La.App. 1st Cir.1975); Breaux v. Louisiana Farm Bureau Mut. Ins. Co., 413 So.2d 988 (La.App. 1st Cir.1982); Lane v. Fireman's Fund Insurance Company, 344 So.2d 702 (La.App. 4th Cir.1977); Chiasson v. Whitney, 427 So.2d 470 (La. 5th Cir.1983).

Of those eleven, ten declined to allow stacking of medical payments coverages; however, eight of the ten involved only one policy which covered more than one auto, as opposed to separate policies as is the case here and are therefore distinguishable. One case, Breaux, involved one policy covering an auto not occupied during the accident and medical coverage was unavailable through plaintiff's policy on the occupied vehicle. The Third Circuit Court case of Cole is the only one that falls squarely on point with our facts. Of the eleven cases, nine of the policies scrutinized had language identical to the policies herein. All of the cases decided the issue on policy language properly noting the courts must look to the specific provisions of the insurance contract to settle a dispute between the insured and the insurer, as the contract is the law between the parties. LSA-C.C. art. 1901. Thus, the two cases with different language, Bourgeois and Breaux, are inapplicable. Two other cases besides Cole and the others cited above, which did involve a claimant with separate contracts of insurance, were disposed of without addressing the stacking question. Branch v. O'Brien, 396 So.2d 1372 (La.App. 2d Cir. 1981); Crenwelge v. State Farm Mutual Automobile Insurance Co., 277 So.2d 155 (La.App. 3d Cir.1973). There the plaintiffs were denied relief on the basis of their interpretation of the medical payments provision which delineates the specific circumstances under which the parties can recover.

The only case decided in plaintiff's favor on stacking is Easley and it, too, only had one policy at issue. It should be noted, in addition, that Easley was rendered twelve years after Guillory by the same Circuit. The Easley case reversed the Third Circuit *886 Court's prior jurisprudence on the issue. In the Jones case, however, the Third Circuit again reversed its position and in Cole extended its holding to include factual situations involving separate policies as here.

In Cole, the court interpreted the following provisions identical to ones herein as precluding stacking:

Other Insurance. If there is other automobile medical payments insurance against a loss covered by Part 11 of this policy the company shall not be liable under this policy for a greater proportion of such loss than the applicable limit of liability stated in the declarations bears to the total applicable limit of liability of all valid and collectible automobile medical payments insurance;

The court further referred in Footnote 5 to another identical provision which states:

Limit of Liability. The limit of liability for medical payments stated in the declarations as applicable to "each person" is the limit of the company's liability for all expenses incurred by or on behalf of each person who sustains bodily injury as the result of any one accident.

In our opinion, these statements refer solely to the coverages in the particular contract.

Prior to Cole and Jones, the Easley court, in overruling its prior rulings and allowing stacking of medical payments, adopted Judge Tate's reasoning written in his concurring opinion in the 1974 Odom case, and relied on the trend in other states to allow stacking under one policy. In Odom, Judge Tate wrote a reluctant concurring opinion in which he disagreed with the analysis and outcome, but did so anticipating that the Louisiana Supreme Court would speak on the issue.

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Bluebook (online)
433 So. 2d 884, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/hampton-v-thomas-lactapp-1983.