Capital City Ins. Co. v. Hurst

• Decision Date: 03 February 2011
• Docket Number: No. 09–60403.,09–60403.
• Citation: 632 F.3d 898
• Parties: CAPITAL CITY INSURANCE COMPANY, Plaintiff–Appellee,v.Latasha HURST, Individually and As Administratrix of the Estate of Lecedrick Hurst; Diondrick Hurst and Lecedrick Hurst, Minors By and Through Their Parent and Natural Guardian, Latasha Hurst, Defendant–Appellant.
• Court: U.S. Court of Appeals — Fifth Circuit

632 F.3d 898

CAPITAL CITY INSURANCE COMPANY, Plaintiff–Appellee,

v.Latasha HURST, Individually and As Administratrix of the Estate of Lecedrick Hurst; Diondrick Hurst and Lecedrick Hurst, Minors By and Through Their Parent and Natural Guardian, Latasha Hurst, Defendant–Appellant.

No. 09–60403.

United States Court of Appeals, Fifth Circuit.

Feb. 3, 2011.

Hubert Wesley Williams, III, James Henderson Hall, Bridgette Trenette Thomas, Markow Walker, P.A., Ridgeland, MS, for Plaintiff–Appellee.Johnell Mosby Matthews, Chrystal Michelle Matthews, Matthews & Matthews, Baton Rouge, LA, for Defendant–Appellant.Appeal from the United States District Court for the Southern District of Mississippi.Before KING, DeMOSS and PRADO, Circuit Judges.PRADO, Circuit Judge:

Lecedrick Hurst—husband of Latasha Hurst—was killed on October 30, 2004, when he was thrown from his vehicle after it collided with Darral Bell's vehicle. Minutes before the collision, Hurst and Bell had an altercation at an acquaintance's house during which Hurst slapped and threatened Bell. A jury convicted Bell of manslaughter, without malice aforethought, in the heat of passion. Latasha Hurst brought a wrongful death action against Bell and, inter alia, his employer, Pinewood Logging, Inc. (“Pinewood”), as Bell was driving a Pinewood-owned vehicle when the collision occurred. Capital City Insurance Company (“Capital City”) had previously issued Pinewood a commercial automobile insurance policy (“the Policy”), and filed the instant suit seeking a declaratory judgment that the October 30, 2004 collision was excluded from the Policy's coverage under its “expected or intended injury” exclusion. The district court granted Capital City's motion for summary judgment, from which defendants appeal. We affirm the district court.

I. FACTUAL AND PROCEDURAL BACKGROUND

On October 30, 2004, Lecedrick Hurst and Bell got into an argument at an acquaintance's home in Gloster, Mississippi, during which Hurst struck Bell and each threatened the other. After being asked to leave the premises, Bell departed in his Pinewood-owned Ford F–350 truck and Hurst followed him in his Yamaha four-wheeled vehicle. At some point Hurst drove alongside Bell in an apparent attempt to pass Bell and the cars collided, throwing Hurst out of his vehicle. Hurst died from his injuries.

Bell was indicted on murder charges on March 9, 2005, and was tried on May 16–18, 2006. The jury was given instructions on murder and manslaughter, and was told it could consider whether Hurst's death was an accidental homicide and find Bell not guilty. The murder instruction read:

Darral Bell has been charged with the offense of murder. If you find from the evidence in this case beyond a reasonable doubt that:

1. Darral Bell, on or about October 30, 2004, in Amite County, Mississippi;

2. Wilfully, with a deliberate design to effect the death of Lecedrick Hurst, killed the said Lecedrick Hurst by running over him with a truck; and

3. Darral Bell was not acting in self-defense

then you shall find the defendant guilty as charged.

If the prosecution has failed to prove any one or more of the above listed elements beyond a reasonable doubt, then you shall find Darral Bell not guilty of murder.

The court's “deliberate design” instruction provided that:

“[D]eliberate design” ... means an intent to kill without authority of law, and not being legally justifiable, or legally excusable. “Deliberate” always indicates full awareness of what one is doing, and generally implies careful and unhurried consideration of the consequences. “Design” means to calculate, plan, or contemplate. “Deliberate design” to kill a person may be formed very quickly, and perhaps only moments before the act of killing the person. However, a “deliberate design” cannot be formed at the very moment of the fatal act.

The instructions further provided that if the jury found Bell not guilty of murder, then they should continue deliberating and consider whether he is guilty of manslaughter. The manslaughter instruction provided that:

[M]anslaughter is the killing of a human being, without malice aforethought, and in the heat of passion by the use of a deadly weapon, without authority of law. Thus, if you find from the evidence, that the State has proven beyond a reasonable doubt all of the following material elements that:

1. The defendant, Darral Bell, did wilfully, feloniously and without authority of law and without malice aforethought, in the heat of passion, with the use of an automobile, did run over and kill Lecedrick Hurst, a living person, and further,

2. That the defendant, Darral Bell, had the mental capacity to realize and appreciate the nature and quality of his acts and to distinguish right from wrong at the time he committed these acts;

Then you shall find the defendant, Darral Bell, guilty of manslaughter.

However, if the State has failed to prove any one of the elements of the charge of manslaughter beyond a reasonable doubt, you may consider whether the death of Lecedrick Hurst was an accidental homicide.

A separate instruction further clarified that if the State failed to meet its burden in proving manslaughter, without malice, in the heat of passion, the jury was to find Bell not guilty of manslaughter. The instructions elsewhere stated that “[a] killing, even though intentional, committed on impulse in the heat of passion is without deliberation and without malice aforethought,” that malice aforethought required “premeditation and deliberation,” and that deliberation requiring “giv[ing] consideration to the intent to kill.” The verdict form gave the jury the option of finding Bell guilty of murder, manslaughter, or not guilty.

The jury returned a verdict of not guilty on the murder instruction and guilty on the manslaughter instruction. Bell's conviction was affirmed by the Mississippi Supreme Court. Bell v. State, 963 So.2d 1124 (Miss.2007).

Latasha Hurst filed a wrongful death suit on April 4, 2005, against Bell and others, including Pinewood. On June 22, 2005, Capital City filed a declaratory judgment action in district court.¹ While Capital City agreed to defend Pinewood in the wrongful death case, Capital City sought a declaration that there was no coverage under the Policy for the collision that killed Lecedrick Hurst. Specifically, the Policy provides that:

We will pay all sums an “insured” legally must pay as damages because of “bodily injury” or “property damage” to which this insurance applies, caused by an “accident” and resulting from the ownership, maintenance or use of a covered “auto”.The Policy defines “accident” as “includ[ing] continuous or repeated exposure to the same conditions resulting in ‘bodily injury’ or ‘property damage.’ ” The Policy has a series of exclusions, including excluding coverage for “ ‘[b]odily injury’ or ‘property damage’ expected or intended from the standpoint of the ‘insured.’ ”

Capital City filed a motion for summary judgment on September 22, 2008, arguing that the manslaughter conviction collaterally estopped the defendants—the plaintiffs in the wrongful death action—from re-litigating the question of whether Bell intended to cause Lecedrick Hurst's death. The district court granted the motion on February 25, 2010, noting that Bell made a voluntary statement to police that was admitted at trial that he was driving in the middle of the road to prevent Hurst from passing him. While never expressly analyzing the preclusive effect of the prior conviction, the district court concluded Bell's conduct was intentional and therefore excluded from the Policy's coverage. Defendants timely appealed.

II. JURISDICTION AND STANDARD OF REVIEW

Subject-matter jurisdiction in this case is based on diversity of citizenship, and we apply the substantive law of the forum state—in this case Mississippi—to determine the conviction's preclusive effect on litigation over the Policy's coverage for the October 30, 2004 accident. See Ideal Mut. Ins. Co. v. Last Days Evangelical Ass'n, 783 F.2d 1234, 1240 (5th Cir.1986) (stating that a federal court applies the substantive law of the forum state in a diversity action).

We review “ ‘the grant of summary judgment de novo, applying the same standards as the district court.’ ” In re Egleston, 448 F.3d 803, 809 (5th Cir.2006) (quoting In re Intelogic Trace, Inc., 200 F.3d 382, 386 (5th Cir.2000)). Summary judgment is appropriate when “the movant shows that there is no genuine dispute as to any material fact and the movant is entitled to judgment as a matter of law.” Fed. R. Civ. P. 56(a). “We construe all facts and inferences in the light most favorable to the nonmoving party when reviewing grants of motions for summary judgment.” Murray v. Earle, 405 F.3d 278, 284 (5th Cir.2005) (citation omitted).

III. ANALYSIS

The Full Faith and Credit Act, 28 U.S.C. § 1738, requires federal courts to give the same preclusive effect to state court judgments that those judgments would receive in the courts of the state from which the judgments emerged. Raju v. Rhodes, 7 F.3d 1210, 1214 (5th Cir.1993). In Mississippi, collateral estoppel requires that four elements be satisfied: “(1) A party must be seeking to relitigate a specific issue; (2) that issue already had been litigated in a prior lawsuit; (3) that issue actually was determined in the prior lawsuit; and (4) that determination of the issue was essential to the judgment in the prior lawsuit.” Id. at 1215 (citing Dunaway v. W.H. Hopper & Assocs., 422 So.2d 749, 751 (Miss.1982)). While Mississippi requires identity of the parties, “strict identity of parties is not necessary for either res judicata or collateral estoppel to apply, if it can be shown that a nonparty stands in privity with the party in the prior action.” EMC Mortg. Corp. v. Carmichael, 17 So.3d 1087, 1090–91 (Miss.2009).

Appellants frame their appeal as raising two issues: (1) whether Bell's driving in the middle of the road to stop Hurst was, as ...