Case Name: ALLEN PARK THEATRE COMPANY, INC v. MICHIGAN MILLERS MUTUAL INSURANCE COMPANY
Court: Michigan Court of Appeals
Jurisdiction: Michigan
Decision Date: 1973-06-28
Citations: 48 Mich. App. 199
Docket Number: Docket No. 14757
Parties: ALLEN PARK THEATRE COMPANY, INC v MICHIGAN MILLERS MUTUAL INSURANCE COMPANY
Judges: Before: Fitzgerald, P.J., and V. J. Brennan and O’Hara, JJ.
Reporter: Michigan appeals reports; cases decided in the Michigan Court of Appeals.
Volume: 48
Pages: 199–212

Head Matter:
ALLEN PARK THEATRE COMPANY, INC v MICHIGAN MILLERS MUTUAL INSURANCE COMPANY
Opinion of the Court
1. Insurance — Fire Insurance Policy — Business-Interruption Benefits — Physical Damage — Burden.
The burden is on an insurer to say so unequivocally in its standard fire insurance policy which includes extended coverage and business-interruption endorsements if the insurer wanted to be sure that the payment of business-interruption benefits had to be accompanied by physical damage.
Dissent by Fitzgerald, P. J.
2. Insurance — Fire Insurance Policy — Extended Coverage — Direct Loss — Words and Phrases — Condition Precedent.
The word "direct”, as defined in an extended-coverage endorsement of a standard fire insurance policy, is not susceptible of ambiguous interpretation; "loss limited and conditioned in such policy, resulting from direct loss to property from the perils insured against” can mean only that direct loss to property must occur as a condition precedent for recovery under the policy, therefore, an actual damage to or destruction of the insured premises is required in order for the insured owners to be reimbursed for losses suffered.
3. Insurance — Fire Insurance Policy — Business-Interruption Clause — Contracts—Construction.
A business-interruption rider to a standard Ore insurance policy is not a separate and independent agreement without reference to either the standard policy or the extended-coverage endorsement; it is fundamental that insurance policies must be construed as a whole, the intent of the parties being gathered from the four corners of the instrument.
References for Points in Headnotes
[1, 3, 4] 44 Am Jur 2d, Insurance § 1694.
44 Am Jur 2d, Insurance § 1898.
4. Insurance — Insured Premises — Denial op Access — Order of Civil Authority — Business Loss — Reimbursement.
A proper interpretation of a standard fire insurance policy, its extended-coverage endorsement and its business-interruption rider leads to a conclusion that the denial of access to insured premises by order of civil authority cannot be reimbursed as a business loss where no damage to or destruction of the insured property occurs because physical damage was required as a condition precedent to the right of recoupment of losses sustained due to an order by civil authority.
Appeal from Oakland, Arthur E. Moore, J.
Submitted Division 1 March 12, 1973, at Detroit.
(Docket No. 14757.)
Decided June 28, 1973.
Complaint by Allen Park Theatre Company, Inc., and others against Michigan Millers Mutual Insurance Company and Michigan Mutual Liability Company to recover for business losses under policies of business-interruption insurance issued by the defendants. Judgment for plaintiffs. Defendants appeal.
Affirmed.
David Newman and Gerald Curtis, for plaintiffs.
Denenberg, TufSey & Thorpe, for defendants Michigan Millers Mutual Insurance Company, as to the Americana Theatre only, and Michigan Mutual Liability Company.
Before: Fitzgerald, P.J., and V. J. Brennan and O’Hara, JJ.
Former Supreme Court Justice, sitting on the Court of Appeals by assignment pursuant to Const 1963, art 6, § 23 as amended in 1968.

Opinion:
O'Hara, J.
I agree that the insurance policy in this case can be read with complete logic to arrive at the result reached by Judge Fitzgerald. I am, however, compelled to say that the result reached in Sloan v Phoenix of Hartford Ins Co, 46 Mich App 46; 207 NW2d 434 (1973), is just as logically possible. Under these circumstances I am compelled to hold with the Sloan Court. If the insurer wanted to be sure that the payment of business-interruption benefits had to be accompanied by physical damage it was its burden to say so une-quivocally. Under the authority of Sloan the trial judge is affirmed.
V. J. Brennan, J., concurred.