Kovacs v. Cornerstone National Insurance

736 S.E.2d 105, 318 Ga. App. 99, 2012 Fulton County D. Rep. 3264, 2012 Ga. App. LEXIS 860
CourtCourt of Appeals of Georgia
DecidedOctober 19, 2012
DocketA12A0821
StatusPublished
Cited by5 cases

This text of 736 S.E.2d 105 (Kovacs v. Cornerstone National Insurance) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering Court of Appeals of Georgia primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
Kovacs v. Cornerstone National Insurance, 736 S.E.2d 105, 318 Ga. App. 99, 2012 Fulton County D. Rep. 3264, 2012 Ga. App. LEXIS 860 (Ga. Ct. App. 2012).

Opinion

Miller, Presiding Judge.

Joseph Kovacs sued Joshua Lockhart to recover damages that Kovacs sustained when he was struck by a vehicle driven by Lock-hart. Cornerstone National Insurance Company (“Cornerstone”) had issued an automobile insurance policy covering Lockhart’s mother and the vehicle involved in the accident. Cornerstone filed a declaratory judgment action with the trial court seeking a determination that it was not required to provide coverage for the accident since Lockhart was excluded from coverage under the policy. Cornerstone filed a motion for summary judgment on the issue, which the trial court granted. Kovacs appeals the trial court’s ruling. We agree with Kovacs that the trial court erred in finding that the nonpermissive user exclusion barred coverage. We nevertheless affirm the trial court’s grant of summary judgment to Cornerstone because the evidence shows that the unlisted household resident exclusion applied in this case.

Summary judgment is appropriate if the pleadings and evidence “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.” OCGA § 9-11-56 (c). On appeal from the grant or denial of summary judgment, we conduct a de novo review, with all reasonable inferences construed in the light most favorable to the nonmoving party. A grant of [100]*100summary judgment must be affirmed if right for any reason, whether stated or unstated. It is the grant itself that is to be reviewed for error, and not the analysis employed.

(Footnote omitted.) Alston & Bird LLP v. Mellon Ventures II, L.P., 307 Ga. App. 640 (706 SE2d 652) (2011).

So viewed, the evidence shows that Lockhart entered into an agreement with his uncle to purchase a vehicle and paid a deposit pursuant to that agreement. Before Lockhart paid the entire amount of the negotiated price, his uncle delivered the vehicle to Lockhart’s mother. Thereafter, Lockhart’s mother added the vehicle to her existing insurance policy with Cornerstone. At the time, Lockhart was 17 years old and living at his mother’s residence. Although Lockhart’s mother was required to list all household residents of age 15 years and older, and certified that she included all individuals meeting that criteria, the mother failed to include Lockhart on the Cornerstone insurance application. Lockhart’s mother acknowledged that failing to disclose to Cornerstone any household resident of age 15 years or older would jeopardize her insurance coverage.

When the insurance policy was issued to cover the vehicle, Lockhart had a learner’s permit and not a driver’s license. Lockhart’s mother expressly told Lockhart that he was not to drive the vehicle at all until he received his driver’s license. Despite not having a valid driver’s license and knowing that he did not have his mother’s permission to drive the vehicle, Lockhart drove the vehicle with a licensed driver in July 2009, striking Kovacs as he was walking across the street.

Kovacs subsequently filed suit against Lockhart, seeking damages for his injuries. Cornerstone sought a declaratory judgment that its policy excluded liability coverage for Lockhart’s use of the vehicle. Cornerstone filed a motion for summary judgment, asserting that the policy excluded coverage for Kovacs’s injuries because Lockhart was not a permissive user of the insured vehicle according to the language of the policy, and because Lockhart was not listed on the policy as a household resident over the age of 15 years. The trial court granted Cornerstone’s motion for summary judgment on the basis of the nonpermissive user exclusion since Lockhart did not have his mother’s permission to use the vehicle.

1. Kovacs contends that the trial court erred in granting summary judgment to Cornerstone, because the nonpermissive user exclusion did not apply. We agree.

[I]n Georgia, insurance is a matter of contract, and the parties to an insurance policy are bound by its plain and [101]*101unambiguous terms. Thus, when faced with a conflict over coverage, a trial court must first determine, as a matter of law, whether the relevant policy language is ambiguous. A policy which is susceptible to two reasonable meanings is not ambiguous if the trial court can resolve the conflicting interpretations by applying the rules of contract construction. Where a term of a policy of insurance is susceptible to two or more reasonable constructions, and the resulting ambiguity cannot be resolved, the term will be strictly construed against the insurer as the drafter and in favor of the insured. If a policy exclusion is unambiguous, however, it must be given effect even if beneficial to the insurer and detrimental to the insured. We will not strain to extend coverage where none was contracted or intended.

(Citations and punctuation omitted.) Hays v. Ga. Farm Bureau Mut. Ins. Co., 314 Ga. App. 110, 111-112 (1) (722 SE2d 923) (2012).

The Cornerstone policy provided that it would pay damages for bodily injury for which an insured person becomes legally responsible. Under the policy, an “insured person” was defined, in pertinent part, as the named insured “or a relative with respect to an accident arising out of the ... use of a covered vehicle [.]” A “relative” included any “person residing in the same household as [the insured] and related to [the insured] by blood[.]” However, the policy contained a nonpermissive user exclusion stating that coverage did not apply to “[b]odily injury... arising outof.. .the operation, maintenance or use of a covered vehicle that is without the express or implied permission of the owner.” (Emphasis supplied.)

Although Lockhart was living with his mother at the time of the accident and, thus, was a relative under the policy, the trial court concluded that the nonpermissive user exclusion applied to bar coverage since Lockhart did not have his mother’s permission to use the vehicle. Pretermitting Lockhart’s argument that he had permission to use the vehicle based on his claimed ownership of the vehicle, the evidence shows that the nonpermissive user exclusion did not apply because his mother was not the “owner” of the vehicle.

By its plain terms, the nonpermissive user exclusion applied only when the vehicle was used without the “owner’s” permission. Notably, the policy defined an “owner” as any person who (a) held legal title to the vehicle; (b) had legal possession of the vehicle that was subject to a written security agreement with an original term of six months or more; or (c) had legal possession of the vehicle that was leased to that person under a written security agreement for a continuous period of six months or more. Lockhart’s mother testified that she did [102]*102not own the vehicle, and that, at the time of the accident, a family friend still retained legal title to the vehicle. Nor does the evidence show that Lockhart or his mother possessed the vehicle subject to a written security agreement or lease. Consequently, neither Lockhart nor his mother met the definition of an “owner” under the policy, and there is no evidence as to whether the family friend gave Lockhart permission to use the insured vehicle. Had Cornerstone, as the drafter of the policy, wished to exclude coverage for use of a vehicle without the insured’s permission, it should have done so. See Rutledge v. Auto-Owners Ins. Co., 249 Ga.App. 361, 363 (1) (548 SE2d 86) (2001).

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Bluebook (online)
736 S.E.2d 105, 318 Ga. App. 99, 2012 Fulton County D. Rep. 3264, 2012 Ga. App. LEXIS 860, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/kovacs-v-cornerstone-national-insurance-gactapp-2012.