good morning my name is larry andersen i represent carrie but we're the plaintiff and the appellant in this action i would like to reserve three minutes of my time for rebuttal if i may all right you see the clock there and i'll also try to help you out thank you there are two torts to injuries in this case the story of this case basically starts with the familiar with this story and i'm concerned about your time but we are going to move to the misrepresentation toward yes ok that's exactly where we are all right the basic point here is this we have a montana resident who wrote a law on misrepresentations in montana this montana resident took actions in montana and this montana resident took suffered injuries as a result of the i don't whoa adjustors misrepresentation idaho into montana and key point her in idaho no but the others to judge the chance but the other ones did that's true but key point in this case particularly in the context of misrepresentation to is the reliance a kurd the the the the statement this is a fair offer was directed from him to mine the montana resident took action based on that misrepresentation in montana and the action he took as he agreed to a settlement he signed a settlement  in montana he received a check in mind counsel it seems under one forty eight we're looking at the restatement of course one forty eight is the place of reliance and you said that's montana one forty eight to be is the place restatement comments and jerk the key the key to the analysis of one forty eight two is where was the reliance where was the residence of the of the point if and where were the injuries suffered by all of those are in mind council comment says this is the place where the representations were first communicated to the plaintiff most of the representations were first communicated in idaho but not all of them as we've just discussed but the next sentence says the same comments as this place is not so important  contact as is the place where the plaintiff acted in reliance on the defendant's representation but that's not quoted in the judge's order that's true here's the problem with the judge's order we didn't address one forty eight in our briefing because montana does not have any law on restatement of conflicts one forty eight our basic law comes from the seminal case of philips versus g phil why would montana follow and apply phillips in this case that's that's our point montana would apply phillips in this case because we're talking about a dramatic a dramatic and stark policy differences between montana tort law and i hope torah law as applied to a montana resident and the key point here in this case says phillips is that if you take the underlying principle of the lips which is the most significant relationship approach correct yes man ok and so you're in this situation it's a question of how one filters all the facts through the significant relationship when you simply disagree with how the district court and then yes we do if you look at paragraph fifty three of philips you look at paragraphs fifty three fifty four and fifty five of phillips you look at paragraphs seventy three seventy four and seventy five of phillips the key elements of phillips's what are the what are the policy observation that the district court here applied the most significant relationship yes well but aren't you really were saying they should how judge be analyze the facts under  maybe it's a semantic difference but it looks to me like she did apply the most significant relationship test you just dispute how she applied it to these facts yes we do  accurate well we do but i think you i think you're making him a semantic semantic distinction really without a difference the p key point here is with respect to the one forty eight factors she philips and you see that phillips emphasizes the importance of the stark differences between the policies of the two states and the policy here is we protect in montana tort victims we provide them with maximum compensation to the full extent of the law does directly difference in philips clearly the phillips paradigm would clearly apply under these circumstances you know you're down to two minutes essentially do you want to save the ass yes ma'am good morning may it please the court my name is emily jones i represent intermountain claims in this matter mr butler central argument is that montana's public policy should trump all other choice of law factors in this case however this approach is one that the montana supreme court has expressly rejected in philip's itself are high court has said that there is no public policy exception to the most significant relationship test correctly considered section one forty eight and section one forty five in conjunction with the section six subsection two restatement factors and that her approach was correct so one forty eight to a place of reliance is montana right yes we agree that the place of reliance was montana although i think it is important to note judge kristen that butler did obviously sign the release in montana and he accepted the settlement check in montana but he had to send the release to idaho to trigger court but the other thing that i'd like to get your feedback on here is that the court said this is the place where the representations were first communicated to the plaintiff and most of them were communicated idaho first yes they repeated in montana according to the deposition testimony but then it goes on to say this place is not so important as a contact as is the place where the plaintiff acted in reliance on defendant's representation could i hear your response to that yes your honor and that is true however we don't think the first factor trumps all the other factors and not on balance i just i don't whoa still has the most significant relationship to the parties in the occurrence in this case well i'm just i'm asking a different question so i wasn't very clear on one forty eight to be is your position that that is mixed or does it favor idaho our position as it favors idaho the only representation is that the only representation that was made in montana was that fifty thousand dollars was a fair offer counsel you're not answering the question about the commentary that's here that says this is not as important as where he where he relied so what is your position on that please we agree and that is the law i don't disagree that it's not as important as the place of reliance but there are other factors to consider as well can you clarify something for me the premise for judge butler acted in reliance upon defendant's representations in montana after he consulted his wife and decided to accept your mountains fifty thousand dollar offer and that's not the premise the premise of the question it's a little different just so you have a chance to respond the premise of the question is that one of the representation was only made in montana and it wasn't mentioned by the i'm sorry can you repeat your question well just to understand i think i might have been unclear the premise of the question is my understanding is that you started but under taking a position all the representation for made in idaho one of them wasn't one of them currently made in we you are so i don't know why we're dissecting the district court's opinion exactly so your position i think it is even if there is the single representation that's montana based that the bulk of the representations were i'd hope that's correct as mckeown yes and the initial representations that were allegedly made which all occurred at a face to face meeting in idaho as judge christine pointed out were repeated in phone calls that were made from idaho received in montana or vice versa and then of course the offer made in idaho received in montana so the i think the gist of mr anderson's argument and not a bad one at all is where you started seems that the major difference because this is kind of in the eye of the holder as to which side of the scale of this w but i think what he's saying is that he reads phillips not his saying necessarily the public policy trumps everything in terms of montana but that you can't just ignore it and so given the very different approaches that montana and idaho take how does the montana public policy figure into the analysis here  so philips the philips cortex expressly address this in fellows because as mr butler i'm sorry i was mr anderson stated in his correct philips did rely heavily on the public policy argument for that case but that's a case with very different facts than what we have here the plaintiffs were in kansas essentially by happenstance they were traveling across the country for a family vacation here we have mr butler traveling to idaho on purpose to move his mother in law he has significant contacts with idaho the underlying tort product claim an injury occur in idaho again i know you know all the facts of the case and the montana supreme court said in phillips that while public policy was a important consideration for them in that case that those principles need not be given equal consideration in every case at paragraph seventy one the court said varying weight must be given to a particular factor or group of factors in different areas of choice of law and the court also specifically said that the facts and circumstances of each case are to be considered individually that's right so how do we what does that mean for this case for this case i think it's clear on balance that the state with the most significant relationship to the parties in the occurrence is idaho going through various does that mean occurrence meaning the injury or we talk about the misrepresentation both both your honor clearly with the underlying tort it occurred in idaho the product was purchased and i don't know it was offered for sale in idaho which is exactly why intermountain claims assigned an idaho adjuster to that to consider now when we're talking about that's his argument yes that now we're talking about the misrepresentation fraud and that's a different negotiation between the parties quite different so could you just say well yes i think it is important to note that the underlying claim was adjusted according to idaho law because of its connection with idaho and that is why intermountain claims assigned an idaho adjuster and so it's reasonable to assume that an idaho adjuster would be adjusting and i do hope claim under idaho law and again that's supported by the facts of the case mr butler made that claim in idaho traveled back to the place where he purchased the cargo net to report the alleged defect with it personally met with mr hoffman the adjuster in idaho at a face to face meeting the alleged rep initial representations were made in idaho  something to be discounted it is not something to be discounted your honor it's a weighing it's a balancing test and so on balance the factors favor the application of idaho law so when you move from one forty eight to one forty five  you're looking at context under one forty five i think or your last comments directed primarily to one forty five or to both of them to both of them so our position is the factors of one forty eight and one forty five and section six all on balance in favor of application of idaho law about it because another way to look at this is that we've got this phillips opinion from the montana supreme court and  as you say it's very unusual idaho and montana very different policy one much more protective than the other and a company and insurance companies doing business in both states surely surely very aware of that and  adjuster then you know figure to be reaching across the line to deal with a montana resident there's a i'm not so sure what the montana supreme court would do here in this case given that given those differences you want do you want to speak to that that you're just or was working  sentially across the line and fairly knew that given that he's a licensed professional sure he was dealing with a montana resident and obviously was aware that mr butler was a montana resident but given that he was adjusting a tort claim that i think montana adjuster why it's so important that this is talk about a misrepresentation tort here and not the underlying personal injury claim that's correct your honor and you know i guess i would also go back to the restatement section success factors on justified expectations and certainty predictability and uniformity of result if we expect insurance companies to assign adjusters and essentially conduct a choice of law analysis prior to assigning adjusters and attempt to discern the law that's to be applied in adjusting t claim i think we are going to get a lot of unpredictable and nonuniform results i think closing council second would be that what this played to and who knows about the allegations of the of the misrepresentation claim but his expectations are that are just true would deal with him fairly and surely that's going to be your company's policy regardless of where it's just dangling and i don't who clearly has an interest in regulating that conduct within its own borders and that's where this conduct occurre thank you thank you very much you have some rebuttal time thinking the the first tour of the products torque is clearly governed by montana law based on philips philips is on all fours with the products case philips involved mass a michigan product sold in sold in north carolina  montana and injured inc in kansas montana had in phillips had very little trouble finding that montana's choice of law applied and because of the strong public policies a casual traffic accident that occurred well while passing through on an interstate through kansas this guy had significant contacts with idaho you know i'm not i don't know his contacts a cargo net there  injury occurred there he was loading the truck to move his mother in law from i have no doubt that in do you think the factors if we were just looking at the original product liability claim would apply m absolutely we're talking about we're talking and i'm referring to paragraph fifty three of philips unpaired i'm referring to paragraphs seventy three four and five  you we'll give it back to you thank you the case just argue it is now submitted but we're vs north american capacity thank you for coming over from montana all the council and thank you for your