Mitchell v. Allstate Insurance Co.

244 S.W.3d 59, 2008 Ky. LEXIS 11, 2008 WL 199723
CourtKentucky Supreme Court
DecidedJanuary 24, 2008
Docket2005-SC-000571-DG
StatusPublished
Cited by12 cases

This text of 244 S.W.3d 59 (Mitchell v. Allstate Insurance Co.) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering Kentucky Supreme Court primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
Mitchell v. Allstate Insurance Co., 244 S.W.3d 59, 2008 Ky. LEXIS 11, 2008 WL 199723 (Ky. 2008).

Opinions

Opinion of the Court by

Justice SCOTT.

Appellants, Eric Mitchell and Candace Slade, appeal from a Court of Appeals decision upholding a summary judgment ruling of the Harrison Circuit Court in favor of Appellee, Allstate Insurance Company. The summary judgment ruling held that a car insurance policy’s omnibus clause did not provide coverage for a non-owner driver of the vehicle because the vehicle’s named insured did not consent to the driver’s use of the vehicle. Appellants contend that the question of whether the driver had permission to use the vehicle, and hence had coverage under the policy’s omnibus clause, is a factual issue that should be submitted to a jury. Appellants further request that the “initial permission” rule, which defines the scope of permission one has to use a borrowed vehicle, be adopted in this state. For the reasons set out, we now reverse the Court of Appeals and adopt the initial permission rule.

[61]*61In early 2001, Rita Taylor gave her friend, Virginia Warner, her husband Rodney Taylor’s 1989 Toyota Camry to use for an indefinite term. The car title remained in Mr. Taylor’s name and both Mr. and Mrs. Taylor were the named insureds on the automobile policy issued by Appellee.

On April 1, 2001, Ms. Warner’s son, Allan, asked her for permission to drive the car to work. Ms. Warner granted this request and Allan took the car. At some point during the day, Allan picked up two of his friends, the Appellants, and drove them around. Unfortunately, Allan had a car accident and was killed. Appellants were seriously injured.

In December 2003, Appellee intervened in Appellants’ suit against Allan’s estate seeking a declaration that Allan could not be deemed an insured under the omnibus clause1 of the Taylors’ policy because he did not have permission to drive the car. Supporting this position are statements from Mrs. Taylor indicating that Allan was forbidden from driving the car by her and from Ms. Warner that he exceeded the scope of permission he was granted by her since he was given permission only to drive to work, not to drive around with friends. However, other facts disclosed by Mrs. Taylor indicated that Allan may not have been completely barred from using the vehicle. Such facts include that the Tay-lors were going to let Ms. Warner have the vehicle to use as her own, that the Taylors had no intention of asking for their vehicle back, and that Mrs. Taylor, if asked, would have let Allan drive the vehicle on the day of his accident. Despite the seeming contradiction, the Harrison Circuit Court granted summary judgment to Appellee finding that there were “no issues of material fact in dispute” and Appellee was “entitled to judgment as a matter of law.”

The Court of Appeals upheld the summary judgment, finding that Appellants had “proffered no evidence that would permit a jury to disregard Mrs. Taylor’s expressly forbidding Allan from driving her car.” The Court of Appeals believed that Allan’s driving of the car, even with his mother’s permission, was a major deviation from the permission Mrs. Taylor conferred, and thus, under the “minor deviation” rule, no coverage was provided by the omnibus clause. In so deciding, the Court of Appeals acknowledged that had the “initial permission” rule applied, Allan’s use of the vehicle would be covered because his usage, though it frustrated Mrs. Taylor’s restriction, did not amount to a conversion of the vehicle.

I. The initial permission rule satisfies the policy reasons and purpose behind Kentucky’s Motor Vehicle Reparations Act

An automobile insurance company has a general responsibility to provide coverage for people who may not be named insureds in the written policy, but fall under the coverage provided for in the policy. 46 C.J.S. Insurance § 4045 (1993); see also KRS § 304.39-080(5) (requiring that insurance be provided for any vehicle that is operated by the insured or by someone who has the insured’s permission to operate the car). This responsibility is usually satisfied through the language of the policy’s omnibus clause which extends insurance protection to persons other than the [62]*62named insured — including people who pay no premiums toward the policy and are in effect unknown to the insurer. 46 C.J.S. Insurance § 1045 (1998). The omnibus clause’s main purpose is to maximize the availability of insurance proceeds for the benefit of the general public. Id.; see also Burr v. Nationwide Mut. Ins. Co., 178 W.Va. 398, 359 S.E.2d 626, 632 (1987) (“the primary purpose of the omnibus clause in a policy is to maximize the availability of insurance proceeds; that the principal beneficiary of the clause is the general public; and that the clause is remedial in nature and must be construed liberally so as to provide insurance coverage where possible”). Frequently the omnibus clause’s language extends coverage to any individual properly using the insured vehicle. 46 C.J.S. Insurance § 1045 (1993). And generally, an individual is covered if the person driving the insured vehicle had permission to operate the vehicle. See Vezolles v. Home Indem. Co., New York, 38 F.Supp. 455, 459 (W.D.Ky.1941) (“The main purpose of the clause is to substitute the operator of the car for the owner of the car while the car is being operated with the permission of the owner.”); see also Maryland Cas. Co. v. Hassell, 426 S.W.2d 133, 137 (Ky.1967). Such permission can be either express or implied. Id. at 134-135.

Sometimes, as in this matter, an operator of a vehicle has initial express or implied permission to operate a vehicle, but arguably exceeds the scope of the permission granted. In these situations, it is necessary for the courts to determine whether such a violation is egregious enough to justify denying coverage despite the omnibus clause. There are three lines of thought on how to analyze whether the deviation from the scope of permission should negate coverage. See C.T. Dre-chsler, Annotation, Automobile Liability Insurance: Permission or Consent to Employee’s Use of Car Within Meaning of Omnibus Coverage Clause, 5 A.LR.2d 600 (1949); see also 46 C.J.S. Insurance § 1053 (1993) (discussing the different methods of analysis for determining whether the deviation from permissive use of vehicle causes the driver to be uninsured). The harshest rule is the “strict” rule which holds that coverage only exists if the use of the vehicle was one intended by the parties. Id. The intermediate rule is the “minor deviation” rule, where coverage is extended under an omnibus clause as long as the deviation from the granted permission in using the vehicle is “slight and inconsequential, but not if it is substantial.” Id. Kentucky courts have historically applied the “minor deviation” rule in determining whether or not a deviation from the scope of permission invalidates coverage. Hassell, 426 S.W.2d at 138.

The third rule is the “initial permission” rule which allows for coverage even if the use of the vehicle was “not within the contemplation of the parties or was outside any limitations placed upon the initial grant of permission.” 46 C.J.S. Insurance § 1053 (1993).

Free access — add to your briefcase to read the full text and ask questions with AI

Related

Selective Insurance Co. of South Carolina v. Sullivan
694 F. App'x 379 (Sixth Circuit, 2017)
State Farm Mutual Automobile Insurance v. Estate of Carey
2012 ME 121 (Supreme Judicial Court of Maine, 2012)
Allstate Insurance v. Carter
808 F. Supp. 2d 999 (W.D. Kentucky, 2011)
Stewart v. ELCO Administrative Services, Inc.
313 S.W.3d 117 (Court of Appeals of Kentucky, 2010)
Mitchell v. Allstate Insurance Co.
244 S.W.3d 59 (Kentucky Supreme Court, 2008)

Cite This Page — Counsel Stack

Bluebook (online)
244 S.W.3d 59, 2008 Ky. LEXIS 11, 2008 WL 199723, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/mitchell-v-allstate-insurance-co-ky-2008.