Jimkoski v. State Farm Mutual Automobile Insurance

247 F. App'x 654
CourtCourt of Appeals for the Sixth Circuit
DecidedAugust 13, 2007
Docket06-1694
StatusUnpublished
Cited by8 cases

This text of 247 F. App'x 654 (Jimkoski v. State Farm Mutual Automobile Insurance) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering Court of Appeals for the Sixth Circuit primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
Jimkoski v. State Farm Mutual Automobile Insurance, 247 F. App'x 654 (6th Cir. 2007).

Opinions

OPINION

R. GUY COLE, JR., Circuit Judge.

Following the Plaintiffs less-than-hoped-for jury verdict, Plaintiff-Appellant David Jimkoski (“the Estate”), the personal representative of decedent Alger Jimkoski’s Estate, appeals various district court rulings in this diversity insurance-contract action, brought against Defendant-Appellee State Farm Mutual Automobile Insurance Company (“State Farm”), seeking damages for and recovery of unpaid insurance benefits. For the following reasons, we AFFIRM the challenged rulings.

I. BACKGROUND

A. Facts

In October 1976, a speeding pickup truck rear-ended a tractor driven by then forty-one-year-old Alger Jimkoski. The accident launched Alger over 100 feet and left him comatose. Although Alger survived the accident and emerged from the coma, he was rendered mentally and physically disabled. From the time of the accident until his death in August 2000, Alger required constant care, a portion of which was provided at home by his wife, Patricia Jimkoski.

Under Alger’s insurance policy, which was issued by State Farm in accordance with Michigan’s No-Fault Act, Mich. Comp. Laws § 500.3103, et seq., State Farm made payments to the Jimkoskis from the time of Alger’s accident until his death in August 2000. The policy provided $1,000,000 in first-party, no-fault insurance benefits, which covered medical expenses, lost wages, attendant care services, and medical mileage. This case focuses on whether State Farm adequately compensated Patricia for the attendant care services she provided to Alger over the twenty-four-year period from the time of Alger’s accident until his death.

For the first six years after Alger’s accident, State Farm did not compensate Patricia for any of the services she provided to Alger. Beginning in 1983, however, Patricia began submitting monthly affidavits to State Farm outlining the number of hours and the services she performed. From 1983 to Alger’s death in 2000, State Farm paid Patricia for at least a portion of the attendant care services she provided.

Although Patricia testified that she could not recall ever requesting from State Farm compensation for attendant care services prior to 1983, she testified that State Farm told her that it was her “wifely duty” to care for Alger. (Joint Appendix (“JA”) 189, 194.) Patricia began receiving reimbursements for Alger’s attendant care in 1983 only after a State Farm claims supervisor reviewed Alger’s file and logged the following:

It’s rather obvious [that] Mrs. Jimkoski has been a nurse to [Alger] since the accident and we have paid nothing for [658]*658these services. From this date on we will pay $30 per day. For past services rendered we will pay for their car— required to get him to and from the Dr. etc. The payoff is $2697.62. If it were not for the wife[,] we would have to maintain [Alger] in a medical facility.... Simply issue draft to Patricia Jimkoski for car pay-off ... $2697.63. Don’t include [“]bank on draft[”] — simply indicate [“]for past medical nursing care.[”]

(JA 197-98.)

For approximately 10 years, State Farm compensated Patricia at five dollars per hour at six hours per day (i.e., $30 per day). In February 1994, State Farm increased the rate to six dollars per hour but reduced the hours to four (i.e., $24 per day). Patricia testified that she never informed State Farm that the reimbursements might be inadequate because she “trusted State Farm and that’s all they said [she] got paid.” (JA 191.)

B. Procedure

Within two years of Alger’s death, Alger’s Estate brought suit against State Farm in Wayne County Circuit Court seeking $8,000,000 in damages for underpayment of attendant care services that Patricia provided to Alger over twenty-four years. The Estate sought personal injury protection (“PIP”) benefits under the Michigan No-Fault Act, and alleged (1) violations of the Michigan Consumer Protection Act, (2) bad faith breach of an insurance contract, (3) tortious interference with a contract, (4) intentional infliction of emotional distress, and (5) violations of the Michigan Uniform Trade Practices Act. State Farm removed the action to federal court based on diversity of citizenship. After the Estate withdrew several of its claims and the district court granted summary judgment for State Farm on all but one of the Estate’s remaining claims, the case proceeded to trial on only the Estate’s claim for underpayment of PIP benefits (i.e., attendant care services), and, in accordance with Michigan’s “one-year-back” rule, Mich. Comp. Laws § 500.3145(1), this claim was limited to underpayments incurred during the one year prior to Alger’s death.

Before trial, State Farm filed four motions in limine relevant to this appeal. The district court granted State Farm’s motions to preclude the Estate from (1) mentioning benefits that were or were not paid prior to August 14, 1999, or any delay in the payment of those benefits, (2) eliciting opinion testimony from State Farm personnel regarding legal conclusions, and (3) mentioning fraud. The court granted in part and denied in part State Farm’s motion to preclude the Estate from (4) offering the testimony of State Farm personnel who worked on the Jimkoski file before August 14, 1999, to the extent that the Estate could not elicit testimony pertaining to fraud or sexist remarks.

After a four-day trial, the jury returned a verdict in favor of the Estate, finding that the Estate was entitled to recover PIP benefits from State Farm from the period of August 14, 1999, to August 14, 2000, in the amount of $25,000, plus $17,171.22 in statutory interest (i.e., 12%) and $1,011.83 in interest as part of damages (i.e., 2%), for an award totaling $43,183.05. Following the verdict, the Estate filed a motion for additur or, in the alternative, a new trial on damages, along with a motion for attorney fees. The district court denied the Estate’s motion, and this timely appeal followed.

II. DISCUSSION

A. Summary Judgment

The Estate challenges the district court’s grant of summary judgment in favor of State Farm — which came via a State [659]*659Farm motion for reconsideration — that pruned the Estate’s case down to a single claim for PIP benefits allegedly unpaid during the one year prior to Alger’s death. The Estate argues that it should have been allowed to proceed to trial on (1) a claim for underpayment of PIP benefits covering not just the one year prior to Alger’s death, but for the entire 24 years following Alger’s accident, and (2) a bad-faith-breach-of-insurance-contract claim.

1. Standard of Review

Normally, we review a district court’s decision regarding a motion for reconsideration for an abuse of discretion. Where, however, as here, the motion seeks reconsideration of a summary-judgment grant, we review the decision de novo as though we were reviewing the summary-judgment grant. Hansmann v. Fid. Invs. Institutional Sens. Co., 326 F.3d 760, 766-67 (6th Cir.2003). Summary judgment is appropriate “if the pleadings, depositions, answers to interrogatories, and admissions on file, together with the affidavits, if any, show that there is no genuine issue as to any material fact and that the moving party is entitled to a judgment as a matter of law.” Fed.R.Civ.P.

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Bluebook (online)
247 F. App'x 654, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/jimkoski-v-state-farm-mutual-automobile-insurance-ca6-2007.