State Farm Mut. Auto. Ins. Co. v. Brown

• Decision Date: 26 June 2009
• Docket Number: 1051336.
• Citation: 26 So.3d 1167
• Parties: STATE FARM MUTUAL AUTOMOBILE INSURANCE COMPANY v. Rachel BROWN, a minor, by and through her parents, Michael Brown and Rosemary Gilbert.
• Court: Alabama Supreme Court

26 So.3d 1167

STATE FARM MUTUAL AUTOMOBILE INSURANCE COMPANY v. Rachel BROWN, a minor, by and through her parents, Michael Brown and Rosemary Gilbert.

1051336.

Supreme Court of Alabama.

June 26, 2009.

Mark D. Hess and Laura S. Dunning of Haskell Slaughter Young & Rediker, LLC, Birmingham, for appellant.

Nat Bryan and Thomas M. Powell of Marsh, Rickard & Bryan, P.C., Birmingham, for appellee.

PER CURIAM.

State Farm Mutual Automobile Insurance Company ("State Farm") appeals by permission, pursuant to Rule 5, Ala.R.App. P., from the denial of its summary-judgment motion in an action brought by Rachel Brown, a minor, by and through her parents, Michael Brown and Rosemary Gilbert, to recover uninsured/underinsured-motorist ("UIM") benefits. We reverse and remand.

Facts and Procedural History

For purposes of this permissive appeal, we assume the following relevant facts. Rachel is an unmarried and unemancipated minor whose parents are divorced. When Rachel's parents divorced, they were awarded joint custody of Rachel. Rachel was injured in an automobile accident on February 2, 2004. At that time, Rachel lived primarily with her mother and attended a local high school. On February 28, 2006, Rachel sued State Farm seeking UIM benefits, which she alleged she was entitled to under Mr. Brown's automobile insurance policy with State Farm.

Ultimately, State Farm filed a motion for a summary judgment, which the trial court denied. Subsequently, the trial court certified its interlocutory order denying State Farm's summary-judgment motion for permissive review under Rule 5, Ala. R.App. P. Pursuant to Rule 5, State Farm then filed a petition for permission to appeal to this Court, which this Court granted.

Discussion

In its certification for permissive appeal, the trial court must include a statement of the controlling question of law. In conducting our de novo review of the question presented on a permissive appeal, "this Court will not expand its review ... beyond the question of law stated by the trial court. Any such expansion would usurp the responsibility entrusted to the trial court by Rule 5(a)[, Ala. R.App. P.]." BE & K, Inc. v. Baker, 875 So.2d 1185, 1189 (Ala.2003). Therefore, the only issue before this Court is the following question of law identified by the trial court in its Rule 5 certification:

"Assuming that at the time of her accident Rachel `live[d] primarily' with her mother and not with [Mr. Brown], whether she nevertheless qualifies as [Mr. Brown]'s `relative' as his `unmarried and unemancipated child away at school' so as to be entitled to UIM benefits under [Mr. Brown]'s State Farm polic[y]?"

The answer to this controlling question of law hinges on the interpretation of the language in the UIM provision in Mr. Brown's automobile insurance policy. Mr. Brown's policy provides UIM benefits to those "insured" under the policy. Under the UIM-coverage section of the policy, "insured" is defined as follows:

"Insured—means the person or persons covered by uninsured motor vehicle coverage.

"This is:

"1. the first person named in the declarations;

"2. his or her spouse;

"3. their relatives ...."

(Emphasis added.)

Rachel claims that she is entitled to UIM benefits under the policy because she is Mr. Brown's "relative," a term defined in the policy as follows: "Relative—means a person related to you or your spouse by blood, marriage or adoption who lives primarily with you. It includes your unmarried and unemancipated child away at school." (Emphasis added.) The controlling question of law as posed by the trial court assumes that Rachel was not living primarily with Mr. Brown at the time of the accident.

Although this Court has previously addressed the first sentence of State Farm's two-sentence definition of "relative"—"a person related to you or your spouse by blood, marriage or adoption who lives primarily with you"—in an identical policy provision, State Farm Mutual Automobile Insurance Co. v. Harris, 882 So.2d 849 (Ala.2003), we have not yet addressed the second sentence containing the language at issue in this case.¹

"When analyzing an insurance policy, a court gives words used in the policy their common, everyday meaning and interprets them as a reasonable person in the insured's position would have understood them. Western World Ins. Co. v. City of Tuscumbia, 612 So.2d 1159 (Ala.1992); St. Paul Fire & Marine Ins. Co. v. Edge Mem'l Hosp., 584 So.2d 1316 (Ala.1991). If, under this standard, they are reasonably certain in their meaning, they are not ambiguous as a matter of law and the rule of construction in favor of the insured does not apply. Bituminous Cas. Corp. v. Harris, 372 So.2d 342 (Ala.Civ.App.1979). Only in cases of genuine ambiguity or inconsistency is it proper to resort to rules of construction. Canal Ins. Co. v. Old Republic Ins. Co., 718 So.2d 8 (Ala.1998). A policy is not made ambiguous by the fact that the parties interpret the policy differently or disagree as to the meaning of a written provision in a contract. Watkins v. United States Fid. & Guar. Co., 656 So.2d 337 (Ala.1994). A court must not rewrite a policy so as to include or exclude coverage that was not intended. Upton v. Mississippi Valley Title Ins. Co., 469 So.2d 548 (Ala.1985)."

B.D.B. v. State Farm Mut. Auto. Ins. Co., 814 So.2d 877, 879-80 (Ala.Civ.App.2001). However, if a provision in an insurance policy is found to be genuinely ambiguous, "policies of insurance should be construed liberally in respect to persons insured and strictly with respect to the insurer." Crossett v. St. Louis Fire & Marine Ins. Co., 289 Ala. 598, 603, 269 So.2d 869, 873 (1972).

Both State Farm and Rachel argue that State Farm's definition of the term "relative" is not ambiguous. State Farm alleges that the "words used in the policy," when interpreted "as a reasonable person in the insured's position would have understood them," 814 So.2d at 880, require that the two sentences that compose the definition of the term "relative" in the policy be read conjunctively. Thus, State Farm contends, reading the sentences conjunctively, this Court must first determine with whom Rachel "lives primarily" before getting to the question whether she was "away at school." Such a reading requires Rachel to be, while "away at school," away from...