Johnson v. Cummiskey

765 N.W.2d 652, 2009 Minn. App. LEXIS 90, 2009 WL 1444184
CourtCourt of Appeals of Minnesota
DecidedMay 26, 2009
DocketA08-1315
StatusPublished
Cited by3 cases

This text of 765 N.W.2d 652 (Johnson v. Cummiskey) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering Court of Appeals of Minnesota primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
Johnson v. Cummiskey, 765 N.W.2d 652, 2009 Minn. App. LEXIS 90, 2009 WL 1444184 (Mich. Ct. App. 2009).

Opinion

OPINION

ROSS, Judge.

A driver whose car had only $30,000 of liability insurance coverage struck a motorcyclist, causing the motorcyclist $134,000 in damages. The motorcyclist recovered $34,000 from the car’s driver and the driver’s insurer. The motorcyclist then sought the balance from his own policy’s underinsured motorist (UIM) coverage. He sued his insurer after it applied the limits-less-paid clause of his policy to pay him only a portion of his remaining damages, deducting the $34,000 already paid to him. Injured motorcyclist Larry Johnson appeals from the district court’s summary judgment decision dismissing his claim in favor of his insurer, Illinois Farmers Insurance Company. We are asked to decide whether the No-Fault Automobile Insurance Act invalidates the limits-less-paid clause of Johnson’s policy with Illinois Farmers and instead requires Illinois Farmers to pay Johnson using the damages-less-paid method. Because we conclude that the No-Fault Act does not require a motorcycle insurance policy that provides some UIM coverage to provide all UIM coverage required of policies for other types of vehicles, we affirm.

FACTS

The facts relevant to this appeal are undisputed. In July 2005, Brian Cummis-key’s Mercury Grand Marquis collided with Larry Johnson’s Harley-Davidson, causing Johnson at least $134,000 in damages. Cummiskey was 100% at fault, but *655 he carried only $30,000 in automobile liability coverage. Johnson sued to recover his damages from Cummiskey and from Johnson’s own insurance provider, Illinois Farmers Insurance Company.

Johnson settled with Cummiskey for $34,000 — -$4,000 from Cummiskey and $30,000 from Cummiskey’s insurer — and claimed that he also was entitled to the $100,000 maximum of UIM coverage under his own policy with Illinois Farmers. But the UIM provision of Johnson’s policy contains a limits-less-paid reducing clause, so Illinois Farmers agreed to pay Johnson only $66,000, calculated by subtracting from his policy’s $100,000 limit the $34,000 he had already received from Cummiskey and Cummiskey’s insurer. The limits-less-paid clause that Illinois Farmers relies on and which triggered this dispute states as follows:

We will pay an insured person for unpaid damages resulting from a motor vehicle accident ... but not more than: ... [t]he lesser of the difference between the limit of uninsured (underin-sured) motorist coverage and the amount paid to the insured person by any party held to be liable for the accident.

The district court agreed with Illinois Farmers and applied this reducing clause by its express terms, granting Illinois Farmers’ motion for summary judgment and limiting Johnson’s recovery for UIM coverage to $66,000.

Johnson appeals.

ISSUE

Does the No-Fault Automobile Insurance Act require a motorcycle insurance policy to be reformed to provide full UIM coverage using a damages-less-paid structure, which is statutorily required of policies insuring other types of vehicles, because the motorcycle policy provides some UIM coverage?

ANALYSIS

Johnson contests the district court’s summary judgment decision against him. Because no factual disputes exist, we review summary judgment to determine whether the district court correctly applied the law. State by Cooper v. French, 460 N.W.2d 2, 4 (Minn.1990). We hold that it did.

Johnson argues that the district court based summary judgment on its erroneous understanding of Minnesota’s No-Fault Automobile Insurance Act, Minn. Stat. §§ 65B.41-.71 (2008). He contends that Illinois Farmers must pay him the $100,000 maximum of his UIM policy — the amount of his total damages that Cummis-key and Cummiskey’s insurer did not cover. According to Johnson, the No-Fault Act requires auto insurers to provide all vehicles with full UIM coverage when the insurer provides a motorcyclist with any UIM coverage at all.

Both parties agree that the focal point of this dispute is the coverage method that the No-Fault Act applies to UIM insurance on some types of vehicles. The disputed statute with its heading reads as follows:

Liability on underinsured motor vehicles. With respect to underinsured motorist coverage, the maximum liability of an insurer is the amount of damages sustained but not recovered from the insurance policy of the driver or owner of any underinsured at fault vehicle. If a person is injured by two or more vehicles, underinsured motorist coverage is payable whenever any one of those vehicles meets the definition of underin-sured motor vehicle in section 65B.43, subdivision 17. However, in no event shall the underinsured motorist carrier *656 have to pay more than the amount of its underinsured motorist limits.

Minn.Stat. § 65B.49, subd. 4a. Courts have consistently interpreted this provision to hold that UIM coverage must be calculated as “damages less paid” coverage (also known as modified “add-on” coverage), which would conflict with the limits-less-paid calculation that the Johnson-Illinois Farmers policy directs. See Dohney v. Allstate Ins. Co., 632 N.W.2d 598, 603 (Minn.2001) (“[U]nder the current UIM provisions, coverage is ‘damages less paid’ coverage.”); Mitsch v. Am. Nat’l. Prop. & Cas. Co., 736 N.W.2d 355, 358 (Minn.App.2007) (“Minnesota law mandates that all UIM coverage issued in the state be ‘add-on’ coverage.”), review denied (Minn. Oct. 24, 2007); Theodore J. Smetak, Underin-sured Motorist Coverage in Minnesota: Old Precedents in a New Era, 24 Wm. Mitchell L.Rev. 857, 873 (1998) (characterizing the No-Fault Act as requiring “damages less paid” coverage, also described as “modified ‘add-on’ coverage”). Johnson accurately explains that if we apply the coverage method of subdivision 4a to his claim, he would receive $100,000 from Illinois Farmers.

Illinois Farmers concedes that if the statutory method applies, Illinois Farmers could not follow the policy’s express language that reduces the coverage by the amount Johnson recovered from Cummis-key. But it contends that the statutory method simply does not apply to motorcycle policies. We must therefore determine whether to apply Minn.Stat. § 65B.49, subd. 4a, the portion of the No-Fault Act that controls the method for measuring required UIM coverage, to the Johnson-Illinois Farmers policy.

We begin with a presumption that Johnson is limited to the bargained-for, limits-less-paid formula, which guaranteed that he would receive a total of no less than $100,000 from all sources if an uninsured or underinsured motorist caused him injuries of at least that amount. Minn. Const, art. I, § 11 (prohibiting laws that impair contract obligations); Dairyland Ins. Co. v. Implement Dealers Ins. Co., 294 Minn. 236, 244-45, 199 N.W.2d 806

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Cite This Page — Counsel Stack

Bluebook (online)
765 N.W.2d 652, 2009 Minn. App. LEXIS 90, 2009 WL 1444184, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/johnson-v-cummiskey-minnctapp-2009.