Sylvester v. FCCI Ins. Co.
| Citation | 373 F.Supp.3d 857 |
| Decision Date | 24 January 2019 |
| Docket Number | Case Number 18-10464 |
| Parties | Kevin SYLVESTER, Plaintiff, v. FCCI INSURANCE COMPANY, Defendant. |
| Court | U.S. District Court — Eastern District of Michigan |
Jonnie Lynn Powers, Ward M. Powers P.C., Ward M. Powers, Northville, MI, for Plaintiff.
Andrea M. Mannino, Deborah Gordon Law, Bloomfield Hills, MI, Shannon L.H. Phillips, Tanya Marie Murray, Nicole E. Wilinski, Collins Einhorn Farrell PC, Southfield, MI, for Defendant.
Plaintiff Kevin Sylvester was working at a construction site in Detroit, Michigan when a thief attempted to steal his employer's tool truck. Sylvester was run over while attempting to prevent the theft. Seeking to recover for his injuries, he has sued defendant FCCI Insurance Company, which issued a commercial vehicle insurance policy to Sylvester's employer, invoking the uninsured motorist coverage endorsement in that policy. FCCI insists that its policy does not cover his loss. The parties have filed cross motions for summary judgment, focusing on the uninsured motorist provisions of the policy. Sylvester suffered his injuries in an accident while occupying his employer's tool truck, and therefore he was an "insured person" under the policy. And the truck qualified as an "uninsured motor vehicle," based on the policy's precise definition of that term, when FCCI declined Sylvester's bodily injury claim. The Court will grant Sylvester's motion for partial summary judgment and deny FCCI's motion.
The parties do not dispute the basic facts.
Kevin Sylvester worked for non-party Springline Excavating, LLC as a heavy equipment operator. On the day of his injury, August 15, 2017, Sylvester was working at a job site near the intersection of I-75 and Mack Avenue in Detroit, on a project known as the "Velodrome." Around 1:15 p.m., Sylvester was on his lunch break with several co-workers, seated near a Ford F-450 tool truck owned by Springline. Some tools carried in the truck were on the ground next to the vehicle, and the keys were in the ignition. Sylvester and two co-workers noticed two unidentified men who approached the truck, tossed some of the nearby tools into the back of it, and climbed into the cab. Sylvester and his co-workers jumped up and approached the truck, intending to remove the keys and foil the getaway of the would-be thieves.
Sylvester testified that he ran toward the truck, initially hoping that the men would flee after realizing that there were witnesses to the crime in progress. Undeterred, the men instead entered the cab of the truck, and one of them tried to start the engine. As Sylvester reached the driver side door of the truck, he put one foot up on the running board, with one hand holding onto the door's armrest, propping the door open as he reached into the cab of the truck with his other arm, trying to snatch the keys. At that point, Sylvester had an elbow on the armrest, both of his feet were on the running board, and he was "reaching all the way in, reaching for the key." The thief, meanwhile, according to Sylvester, was "just trying to kind of push my arms away, trying to keep me from — he wasn't trying to hurt me or anything like that, he was just trying to keep my arm from getting in there."
Sylvester was still hanging onto the side of the truck, trying to get the keys away, when one of the thieves succeeded in starting the engine and shifting the truck into drive. Sylvester was still clinging to the side of the truck, reaching into the cab, when the truck lurched forward and "took off fast." As the truck sped up, Sylvester lost his grip on the door and "slipped off" the running board. He remembered "falling backwards" and "getting hit by the truck." The next thing he recalled was waking up in the hospital. When Sylvester fell to the ground, the rear wheels of the truck ran over his legs, causing severe injuries from which he still has not entirely recovered.
FCCI admits that it issued a commercial vehicle insurance policy that covered the tool truck. The policy contained an endorsement for "Michigan Uninsured Motorists Coverage," which begins as follows:
We will pay all sums the "Insured" is legally entitled to recover as compensatory damages from the owner or driver of an "uninsured motor vehicle". The damages must result from "bodily injury" sustained by the "insured" caused by an "accident". The owner's or driver's liability for these damages must result from the ownership, maintenance or use of the "uninsured motor vehicle".
The policy defined some of the terms in the policy and this endorsement. "Insured" includes any named policy holder and "[a]nyone else ‘occupying’ a covered ‘auto.’ " The term " ‘occupying’ means in, upon, getting in, on, out or off." The term " ‘uninsured motor vehicle’ means a land motor vehicle ... for which an insuring or bonding company denies coverage." The principal policy only obliquely alludes to the term "accident," via the following less-than-exhaustive recitation: " ‘Accident’ includes continuous or repeated exposure to the same conditions resulting in ‘bodily injury’ or ‘property damage.’ " The defendant admits that the plaintiff's injuries meet the policy's definition of "bodily injury."
It appears that Sylvester's only recourse for recovering non-economic damages is the FCCI policy issued to his employer. He filed a worker's compensation claim and recovered his economic damages only. FCCI asserts — and Sylvester does not dispute — that Sylvester did not elect uninsured motorist coverage under his personal automobile insurance policy, and his own insurer has not provided any coverage for his injuries.
Sylvester submitted a claim for uninsured motorist benefits under the FCCI policy on November 1, 2017. On December 4, 2017, FCCI responded with a letter denying the claim because (1) the injuries did not result from an "accident," but instead from intentional acts by the persons who stole the truck; (2) Sylvester was not "occupying" the truck when he fell off of it and was injured; and (3) the truck was not an "uninsured motor vehicle."
Sylvester then sought to recover for bodily injuries under any other provision of the policy. FCCI responded that no other coverage was available, referring specifically to exclusions for worker's compensation, employee indemnification, and employer's liability.
After FCCI denied his claim, Sylvester filed a complaint against it in the Wayne County, Michigan circuit court. FCCI removed the case to this Court invoking diversity jurisdiction. After discovery closed, the parties filed cross motions for summary judgment. They each have filed responses and replies to the respective submissions, and the matter is fully briefed.
The fact that the parties have filed cross motions does not automatically justify the conclusion that there are no facts in dispute. Parks v. LaFace Records , 329 F.3d 437, 444 (6th Cir. 2003) (). Instead, the Court must apply the well-recognized summary judgment standard when deciding such cross motions: the Court "must evaluate each motion on its own merits and view all facts and inferences in the light most favorable to the nonmoving party." Westfield Ins. Co. v. Tech Dry, Inc. , 336 F.3d 503, 506 (6th Cir. 2003).
Summary judgment is appropriate "if 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). When reviewing the motion record, "[t]he court must view the evidence and draw all reasonable inferences in favor of the non-moving party, and determine ‘whether the evidence presents a sufficient disagreement to require submission to a jury or whether it is so one-sided that one party must prevail as a matter of law.’ " Alexander v. CareSource , 576 F.3d 551, 557-58 (6th Cir. 2009) (quoting Anderson v. Liberty Lobby, Inc. , 477 U.S. 242, 251-52, 106 S.Ct. 2505, 91 L.Ed.2d 202 (1986) ). "The court need consider only the cited materials, but it may consider other materials in the record." Fed. R. Civ. P. 56(c)(3).
Here, though, the parties have not seriously contested the basic facts of the case. Where the material facts are mostly settled, and the question before the court is purely a legal one, the summary judgment procedure is well suited for resolution of the case. See Cincom Sys., Inc. v. Novelis Corp. , 581 F.3d 431, 435 (6th Cir. 2009).
This case is here under the Court's diversity jurisdiction, so the Court must "apply the same law that [the] state courts would apply." Auburn Sales, Inc. v. Cypros Trading & Shipping, Inc. , 898 F.3d 710, 715 (6th Cir. 2018) (citing Kurczi v. Eli Lilly & Co. , 113 F.3d 1426, 1429 (6th Cir. 1997) ); see also Erie R.R. Co. v. Tompkins , 304 U.S. 64, 78, 58 S.Ct. 817, 82 L.Ed. 1188 (1938). That law usually comes from the state's highest court. Auburn Sales, Inc. , 898 F.3d at 715. "And where [the state's intermediate] appellate courts have spoken in the Supreme Court's absence, we will normally treat those decisions as authoritative absent a strong showing that the would decide the issue differently." Ibid. (quotation marks omitted). "In this latter scenario, we must also look to other available data, such as Restatements, treatises, law reviews, jury instructions, and any majority rule among other states." Ibid. The parties agree that Michigan law governs.
Each side argues that it is entitled to judgment in its favor as a matter of law. FCCI argues that it has no obligation to pay Sylvester's non-economic damages under the uninsured motorist endorsement for the same reasons...
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