Case Title: Stickney v. State Farm Mut. Auto. Ins. Co.

Citation: 2000-Ohio-386

Docket Number: 

State: ohio

Court: Ohio Supreme Court

Date: 2000-05-24T00:00:00Z

Document:
[Cite as Stickney v. State Farm Mut. Auto. Ins. Co., 88 Ohio St.3d 504, 2000-Ohio-386.] 
 
 
 
 
 
STICKNEY ET AL., APPELLANTS, v. STATE FARM MUTUAL AUTOMOBILE INSURANCE 
COMPANY, APPELLEE. 
[Cite as Stickney v. State Farm Mut. Auto. Ins. Co. (2000), 88 Ohio St.3d 504.] 
Automobile liability insurance — Uninsured/underinsured motorist coverage — Court of 
appeals’ judgment vacated and cause remanded to trial court. 
(No. 98-2445 — Submitted April 26, 2000 – Decided May 24, 2000.) 
APPEAL from the Court of Appeals for Richland County, No. 98CA7. 
__________________ 
 
Elk & Elk Co., L.P.A., Thomas L. Dettelbach and Todd O. Rosenberg, for 
appellants. 
 
Meyers, Hentemann & Rea Co., L.P.A., Henry A. Hentemann and J. Michael 
Creagan, for appellee. 
__________________ 
 
The judgment of the court of appeals is vacated, and the cause is remanded to the 
trial court for further proceedings and consideration, where applicable, of the Supreme 
Court’s decisions in Wolfe v. Wolfe (2000), 88 Ohio St.3d 246, 725 N.E.2d 261, and 
Moore v. State Auto. Mut. Ins. Co. (2000), 88 Ohio St.3d 27, 723 N.E.2d 97. 
 
DOUGLAS, RESNICK, F.E. SWEENEY and PFEIFER, JJ., concur. 
 
DOUGLAS, J., concurs separately. 
 
 
2
 
MOYER, C.J., COOK and LUNDBERG STRATTON, JJ., dissent. 
__________________ 
 
DOUGLAS, J., concurring.  Even a cursory reading of this entry, and others 
like it, reveals that this and other cases are remanded to trial courts to apply Wolfe 
v. Wolfe (2000), 88 Ohio St.3d 246, 725 N.E.2d 261, and Moore v. State Auto. Mut. 
Ins. Co. (2000), 88 Ohio St.3d 27, 723 N.E.2d 97, “where applicable.”  If either or 
both cases are applicable, then the trial courts will have no difficulty in so 
applying.  If neither case is applicable, a fact that is difficult to discern at this 
juncture in all of these cases, given the different policy dates and language used in 
the policies, then trial courts will know to dismiss the case(s) before them.  The 
dissent, I believe, doesn’t give enough credit to our trial courts and attorney 
litigators. 
__________________ 
 
LUNDBERG STRATTON, J., dissenting. I respectfully dissent because I do not 
agree that Wolfe v. Wolfe (2000), 88 Ohio St.3d 246, 725 N.E.2d 261, or Moore v. 
State Auto. Mut. Ins. Co. (2000), 88 Ohio St.3d 27, 723 N.E.2d 97, applies to this 
case.  A remand for application of either one of these cases will result in the parties 
and the court below struggling to comply with an order that has no relevance to the 
issues. 
 
 
3
 
In this case, appellants challenge the constitutionality of Am.Sub.S.B. No. 
20 (“S.B. 20”) and argue that the setoff provision in R.C. 3937.18(A)(2) directly 
conflicts with R.C. 3937.18(H), which limits a loss of consortium claim to the 
single limit of coverage.  The issue of whether the insurance contract constitutes a 
new or a renewal contract was not raised in the court below.  This court will not 
ordinarily consider a claim of error that was not raised in any way in the appellate 
court and was not considered or decided by that court.  State v. Williams (1977), 51 
Ohio St.2d 112, 5 O.O.3d 98, 364 N.E.2d 1364; Toledo v. Reasonover (1965), 5 
Ohio St.2d 22, 34 O.O.2d 13, 213 N.E.2d 179, paragraph two of the syllabus. 
 
In addition, I do not agree that the analysis of R.C. 3937.18(A)(1) in Moore 
v. State Auto. Mut. Ins. Co. has any application to an analysis of R.C. 3937.18(H).  
However, to the extent that the majority believes that these cases apply, I 
respectfully dissent for the reasons set forth in the dissenting opinions in Wolfe v. 
Wolfe, 88 Ohio St.3d at 254, 725 N.E.2d at 268, and Moore v. State Auto. Mut. Ins. 
Co., 88 Ohio St.3d at 33, 723 N.E.2d at 103. 
 
MOYER, C.J., and COOK, J., concur in the foregoing dissenting opinion.