Michigan Court of Appeals; Docket # 330199; Unpublished
Judges Hoekstra, Jansen and Saad; Unanimous, per curiam
Official Michigan Reporter Citation: Not Applicable; Link to Opinion
STATUTORY INDEXING:
Not Applicable
TOPICAL INDEXING:
Uninsured Motorist Benefits – Physical Contact Requirement
CASE SUMMARY:
In this unanimous unpublished per curiam opinion, the Court of Appeals reversed the trial court ruling that plaintiff Ronald Tucker (“Tucker”) was not entitled to uninsured motorist benefits under his policy of insurance for injuries he sustained in a motor vehicle crash caused by another vehicle that did not make physical contact with Tucker’s. The Court reversed the trial court because Tucker’s insurance contract did not require that there be direct physical contact between plaintiff’s vehicle and the hit-and-run vehicle. The Court of Appeals found there was at least a question of fact about whether the hit-and-run vehicle “struck” Tucker’s car within the meaning of the policy
After a hit-and-run driver struck a white van at 70-80 mph, the force of that impact caused the van to hit Tucker’s vehicle. Tucker had an insurance policy with defendant Metropolitan Group Property and Casualty Insurance Company (“Metropolitan”). The policy’s uninsured motorist (“UM”) provision said: “We will pay damages for bodily injury sustained by: 1. You or a relative, caused by an accident arising out of the ownership, maintenance, or use of an uninsured motor vehicle, which you or a relative are legally entitled to collect from the owner or driver of an uninsured motor vehicle[.]” In relevant part, “uninsured motor vehicle” was defined as: “4. a hit and run motor vehicle which causes bodily injury to a person covered under this section as the result of striking that person or a motor vehicle which that person is occupying at the time of the accident. …” Metropolitan denied plaintiff’s claim for UM benefits, asserting that he could not meet the policy’s “striking” requirement. Tucker filed this action for UM coverage and Metropolitan moved for summary disposition. The trial court granted Metropolitan’s motion, concluding that Tucker could not claim UM benefits because the hit-and-run vehicle did not “strike” Tucker’s vehicle.
The Court of Appeals reversed and remanded, finding that there were genuine issues of material fact regarding whether the policy required direct physical contact between plaintiff’s vehicle and the hit-and-run vehicle. In reaching this conclusion, the Court explained the physical contact requirement — that is, whether the hit-and-run vehicle must have direct physical contact with the injured party’s vehicle or whether contact can occur through an intermediate object — depended on the language of the policy. According to the Court, as ordinarily understood in the context of an auto accident, the term “striking” denotes a requirement of some physical contact. Consistent with prior appellate court interpretations of the “physical contact” requirements, the Court said that, in the absence of a modifying term such as “direct,” the term “striking” policies allowed for both “direct or indirect physical contact.” The Court of Appeals continued by citing Lord v Auto-Owners Ins Co, 22 Mich App (1970), for the proposition that, in accidents involving multiple vehicles, the physical reality is that “the impact of the hit-and-run car can be transmitted to [another] car through an intermediate car.” The Court further pointed out that, in the absence of a modifying term such as “direct” in the policy language, the Court would not read into a policy “a requirement that the hit-and-run vehicle must itself strike the injured person’s vehicle.”
Applying the foregoing to this case, the Court of Appeals said there was “at least a question of fact” about whether the hit-and-run vehicle “struck” Tucker’s car within the meaning of the policy, especially because Tucker testified, and statements of the driver of the white van confirmed, that the hit-and-run vehicle forced the van into Tucker’s car.
“Given this evidence, it could reasonably be concluded that there is a substantial physical nexus and that the hit-and-run vehicle accomplished the striking of plaintiff’s car through the use of the intermediate vehicle.”
