Egnatic v. Nguyen

• Decision Date: 29 July 2003
• Docket Number: No. WD 61873.,WD 61873.
• Citation: 113 S.W.3d 659
• Parties: Rick EGNATIC, et al., Appellants, v. Chris NGUYEN, et al.; Defendant; Allstate Insurance Company, Respondent.
• Court: Missouri Court of Appeals

113 S.W.3d 659

Rick EGNATIC, et al., Appellants, v. Chris NGUYEN, et al.; Defendant Allstate Insurance Company, Respondent.

No. WD 61873.

Missouri Court of Appeals, Western District.

July 29, 2003.

Motion for Rehearing and/or Transfer to Supreme Court Denied September 2, 2003.

William L. Carr, Kansas City, MO, for Appellants, Jacquelyn Egnatic and Benjamin Pickert.

Robert H. Houske, Kansas City, MO, for Appellant, Rick Egnatic.

Michael E. McCausland, Kansas City, MO, for Respondent, All State Insurance Co.

Chris Nguyen, for Defendant.

Before ROBERT G. ULRICH, P.J., VICTOR C. HOWARD and THOMAS H. NEWTON, JJ.

ROBERT G. ULRICH, Judge.

Jacquelyn Egnatic ("Ms.Egnatic") appeals the trial court's grant of summary judgment in favor of Allstate Insurance Company ("Allstate") in her action for payment under the uninsured and underinsured provisions of an auto insurance policy that she claimed was in force when she was injured during a motor vehicle accident. The judgment of the trial court is affirmed.

Factual Background

In April 1998, Ms. Egnatic applied for and was issued an auto insurance policy from Allstate covering her 1998 Honda Civic and her 1990 Honda Accord.¹ She applied for the policy through Robert L. Davis, an Allstate agent, at his office located in Independence, Missouri. Ms. Egnatic was a resident of Kansas at the time that she applied for the policy.² She paid her first premium when she applied for the policy.

Allstate issued a Kansas auto insurance policy to Ms. Egnatic, effective April 15, 1998. Ms. Egnatic chose to pay the insurance premium via monthly installments of $127.00. Her second and third premium payments were due on May 15, 1998, and June 15, 1998, respectively. Allstate mailed a notice to Ms. Egnatic on May 25, 1998, stating that her May premium payment had not been received and that a minimum payment of $253.98 was required to keep her policy in force. Ms. Egnatic sent a payment on May 27, 1998, in the amount of $127.00 to Allstate. Allstate sent notice to Ms. Egnatic acknowledging receipt of the $127.00 payment and notifying her that an additional $130.48 was due on or before June 15, 1998, to avoid cancellation of her auto insurance policy.

During the month of May 1998, Ms. Egnatic lived at 629 Lake Forest, Bonner Springs, Kansas. Her mail was delivered to the Lake Forest post office. Ms. Egnatic married Rick Egnatic ("Mr.Egnatic") on June 3,1998. She began relocating her residence to 4237 North 123rd Terrace, Kansas City, Kansas, around June 6, 1998. The relocation took a couple of weeks. Ms. Egnatic contacted the insurance agency around June 12, 1998, and spoke to LaRonda Ward ("Ms.Ward"), an employee of the insurance agency, about her name change. She claims that she told Ms. Ward about her address change during the same conversation. Ms. Ward testified that she did not submit an address change form to Allstate because Ms. Egnatic could not remember some of the details of her new address. Allstate mailed a cover letter and amended auto policy declaration to Ms. Egnatic on June 12, 1998, acknowledging the name change of the insured. These documents were mailed to Ms. Egnatic at the Bonner Springs address and contained a reminder that the cancellation notice sent to her on May 27, 1998, was still in effect. Ms. Egnatic did not make the June premium payment. Allstate cancelled her auto insurance policy on June 15, 1998, for nonpayment of premium.

Ms. Egnatic, Mr. Egnatic, and Benjamin Pickert³ were injured in an auto accident in Kansas City, Missouri, on June 28, 1998, while occupants in Ms. Egnatic's 1998 Honda Civic. Thomas Jones, Ms. Egnatic's attorney, contacted Ms. Ward on June 30, 1998, to provide her with notice of the accident. Rebecca Beasley, Ms. Egnatic's sister-in-law, contacted Ms. Ward and discussed the accident with her on July 1, 1998. Ms. Beasley testified that Ms. Ward told her that the policy had gone into cancellation mode but was not cancelled yet and that the policy would cover the accident if a check for $130.48 were overnighted to the insurance company. The check was accepted and deposited by Allstate on July 3, 1998. On July 6, 1998, Allstate sent Ms. Egnatic a notice of reinstatement effective July 3, 1998. The notice stated that the policy had lapsed from June 15 to July 3, 1998. On July 8, 1998, Allstate mailed an amended auto policy declarations to Ms. Egnatic indicating a change in the named insured's address and a change in the insured's rating territory.

After being released from the hospital, Ms. Egnatic contacted the Robert L. Davis agency regarding insurance coverage for the accident.⁴ Ms. Ward referred Ms. Egnatic to the Allstate 1-800 customer service number. Upon calling that number, Ms. Egnatic spoke to Allstate representative Bob Holliman and was told by him that the June 28, 1998, accident was not covered by Allstate because the policy had lapsed on June 15, 1998, for nonpayment of premium.

Allstate mailed an automobile insurance bill to Ms. Egnatic on July 24, 1998, showing a balance of $255.12 due on or before August 15, 1998. The back of the notice contained a box titled "transaction history from 5/25/98 to 7/24/98." The entry dated 7/7/98 was designated as "premium credit of $74.60." This entry corresponds to a lapse credit in the premium that was granted to Ms. Egnatic on Allstate's computerized business records.

Ms. Egnatic, Mr. Egnatic, and Mr. Pickert (collectively "Plaintiffs") filed suit in Jackson County, Missouri, against Allstate for payment under the uninsured and underinsured provisions of the policy. Plaintiffs later filed an amended petition. In its Answer to Plaintiffs' amended petition, Allstate raised as a defense that the insurance policy was cancelled on June 15, 1998, and not in force on June 28, 1998, the date of the accident. Both parties filed summary judgment motions. The trial court granted summary judgment in favor of Allstate and denied Plaintiffs' motion for reconsideration on September 5, 2002. This appeal followed.

Ms. Egnatic raises two points on appeal. She first contends that the trial court erred in granting summary judgment to Allstate because the evidence was insufficient for summary judgment purposes in that whether Allstate complied with its own cancellation and reinstatement procedures was subject to more than one reasonable and differing interpretation, thereby precluding summary judgment. In her second point on appeal, Ms. Egnatic claims that the trial court erred in granting summary judgment to Allstate because she presented evidence that Allstate forfeited the premium payment requirement for coverage in that LaRonda Ward, an employee of the Robert L. Davis agency, acted as an agent for Allstate on July 1, 1998, when she made specific assurances to Ms. Egnatic's sister-in-law that policy coverage for the accident would result if the unpaid $130.48 premium were received the next day via overnight mail. She claims that Allstate ratified LaRonda Ward's conduct by cashing the check sent by overnight mail without reservation.

Standard of Review

Appellate review of the grant of summary judgment is de novo. ITT Commercial Fin. Corp. v. Mid-America Marine Supply Corp., 854 S.W.2d 371, 376 (Mo. banc 1993). The record is reviewed in the light most favorable to the party against whom judgment was entered, according that party all reasonable inferences that may be drawn from the record. Id. (citations omitted).

Summary judgment will be upheld on appeal if there are no genuine issues of material fact and the movant is entitled to judgment as a matter of law. Id. at 377. Facts contained within an affidavit or otherwise in support of a party's response are accepted as true unless contradicted by the non-moving party's response to the summary judgment motion. Id. at 376. A defending party may establish a right to judgment as a matter of law by showing any one of the following: (1) facts that negate any one of the elements of the claimant's cause of action, (2) the non-movant, after an adequate period of discovery, has not and will not be able to produce evidence sufficient to allow the trier of fact to find the existence of any one of the claimant's elements, or (3) there is no genuine dispute as to the existence of each of the facts necessary to support the movant's properly-pleaded affirmative defense. Id. at 381.

Once the movant has established a right to judgment as a matter of law, the non-movant must demonstrate that one or more of the material facts asserted by the movant as not in dispute is, in fact, genuinely disputed. Id. The non-moving party may not rely on mere allegations and denials of the pleadings, but must use affidavits, depositions, answers to interrogatories, or admissions on file to demonstrate the existence of a genuine issue for trial. Id.

Choice of Law

The trial court ruled that Kansas law governed the outcome of this case. Ms. Egnatic's brief cites both Kansas and Missouri law in support of both her points on appeal. Throughout her brief, Ms. Egnatic notes that Missouri law is persuasive on her issues on appeal. Her subtle references to the inapplicability of Kansas precedent suggest that Ms. Egnatic believes that the trial court erred in determining that the insurance policy should be governed by Kansas law. Rather, she implies that the trial court should have applied Missouri law. For that reason, the first issue addressed in this opinion is whether the trial court erred in determining that Kansas law controlled the outcome in this case.

Missouri has adopted sections 188 and 193 of the Restatement (Second) of Conflict of Laws (1971) in determining choice of law issues as they relate to insurance contracts. Hartzler v. Am. Family Mut. Ins. Co., 881 S.W.2d 653, 655 (Mo. App. W.D.1994) (citing Crown Ctr. Redevelopment Corp. v. Occidental Fire & Cas. Co., 716 S.W.2d 348, 358 (Mo.App.1986)). Section 188 provides that the "most significant relationship" determines...