Smith v. Roane, 84-218
| Decision Date | 11 February 1985 |
| Docket Number | No. 84-218,84-218 |
| Parties | Wanda SMITH and Betty Wade, Co-Administratrices of the Estate of Hershel Wane Smith, Deceased, Appellants, v. Betty ROANE, Special Administratrix of the Estate of Dudley C. Roane, Deceased, Appellees. |
| Court | Arkansas Supreme Court |
Jim O'Hara, Fletcher C. Lewis, North Little Rock, for appellants.
Butler, Hicky, Hicky & Routon by Phil Hicky and Preston Hicky, Forrest City, for appellees.
This is a wrongful death case, thus our jurisdiction arises under Arkansas Supreme Court and Court of Appeals Rule 29(1)(o).
The question is whether the determination of an issue in a previously decided insurance coverage case involving these parties is preclusive of an issue in this wrongful death action. The trial judge held there was no such preclusion, and we affirm.
Dudley Roane shot and killed Hershel Smith. Smith's estate filed this wrongful death claim against Roane. Thereafter, Roane's insurer, Fireman's Insurance Company, sought a declaratory judgment against Roane to the effect its policy issued in favor of Roane did not cover any liability he might have arising from the incident. Smith's estate was also a named defendant.
In the declaratory judgment action, the question was whether a coverage exclusion clause applied. The clause provided that if the insured intended or expected the injury to result from his act, there would be no coverage. The jury, in response to a specific interrogatory, found that Roane neither intended to shoot Smith nor expected injury to result to Smith from his act. Thus the defendant, Roane, prevailed in the action, as it was determined his insurance policy covered his possible liability to Smith's estate. Roane thereafter died, and the wrongful death action proceeded against Roane's estate, resulting in a judgment in favor of Roane's estate.
In the wrongful death action, Smith's administratrices moved for a partial summary judgment to prevent Roane's estate from claiming justification or self-defense. The motion was based on argument that Roane's estate could not raise that defense because it had already been determined that Roane did not intend or expect the injury to occur to Smith and thus his estate could not claim justification or self-defense because inherent in such a position is intent or expectation that Smith would be injured by Roane's act.
This is not a matter of res judicata which, through doctrines of merger or bar, precludes relitigation of a cause of action. The first cause of action was one in contract seeking a declaration the insurer was not contractually bound to defend Roane or his estate. The second cause of action is that of Smith's estate against Roane's estate for wrongful death. We are dealing here with a matter of collateral estoppel or, as the Restatement of Judgments would say in preferable terminology, we are concerned with "issue preclusion" rather than extinguishment of a claim. Restatement (Second) of Judgments § 27 (1982).
Section 27 of the Restatement requires that an "issue" have been litigated in the previous case to be binding in the second case....
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