Michigan Court of Appeals; Docket No.184236; Published
Judges Doctoroff, Wahls, and Smolenski; Unanimous; Per Curiam
Official Michigan Reporter Citation: 219 Mich App 340; Link to Opinion 
STATUTORY INDEXING:
Not Applicable
TOPICAL INDEXING:
Uninsured Motorist Benefits: Physical Contact Requirement
CASE SUMMARY:
In this unanimous per curiam published Opinion, the Court of Appeals ruled that the physical contact requirement contained in the definition of a "hit and run" driver under plaintiffs uninsured motorist coverage was satisfied in a case where an object had apparently fallen from another vehicle some time before plaintiff drove over it and lost control of her vehicle causing her injuries.
Plaintiff was driving southbound on a road when she encountered an object in her lane of travel. She attempted to drive over that object, lost control of her vehicle, and received injuries as a result of the accident. A witness testified that he saw a pickup truck approximately 15 minutes before the accident hauling a trailer with a load of scrap iron. This witness, later observed a piece of scrap metal in plaintiffs southbound lane of travel.
The Court of Appeals held that circumstantial evidence and the reasonable inferences therefrom could be satisfactory proof that the scrap metal came from the vehicle seen by the witness, and that it was a piece of scrap metal which had caused plaintiffs accident.
The Court of Appeals also addressed the policy requirement that a hit-and-run vehicle must strike the insured's vehicle and that, as a result, there must be physical contact between the hit-and-run vehicle and the insured's vehicle.
The Court of Appeals, reviewing several prior decisions on the requirement of "physical contact," upheld the trial court's ruling that there was a substantial physical nexus between the plaintiffs vehicle and the hit-and-run vehicle similar to other cases involving objects falling or being propelled from unknown vehicles. Given the witness testimony that there was a man observed inspecting a load of scrap metal in the trailer being pulled by the pickup truck, and given the "temporal and spacial proximity" to plaintiff striking a piece of metal in the road, the Court of Appeals concluded that the legal requirement of a substantial physical nexus between the hit-and-run vehicle and the object struck by plaintiff was established.
The Court of Appeals also addressed the defendant's contention that there was not established any "continuous and contemporaneous force transmitted from the hit-and-run vehicle to plaintiffs vehicle" as required in Kersten v DAIIE, 82 Mich App 459 (1978). The Court of Appeals concluded that the presence of a "continuous and contemporaneously transmitted force" is a significant, but not dispositive, factor to be considered in indirect contact cases in determining whether the requisite substantial physical nexus has been established. In this case, the witness testimony provided the convincing and objective evidence of a hit-and-run vehicle in the absence of a continuous and contemporaneously transmitted force. In this case, the witness testimony established a "continuous sequence of events with a clearly definable beginning and ending" resulting in plaintiffs impact with the piece of metal.
