Opinion ID: 2713050
Heading Depth: 1
Heading Rank: 2

Heading: the majority’s erroneous analysis

Text: The straightforward application of the statutes’ plain language under the Griffith dissent stands in stark contrast to the majority’s effort to apply the Griffith majority’s confusing analysis to this case because, in attempting to clarify Griffith, the majority takes an approach that is divorced from the statutory language. Specifically, I agree with the majority that “nothing in the statutory language of MCL 500.3107(1)(a) supports the notion that postinjury allowable expenses should be reduced by the margin of the injured person’s preinjury expenses of the same character.” Ante at 14. However, the majority is 4 One need only examine this Court’s recent docket to see that Griffith continues to engender confusion and, thus, litigation regarding allowable expenses. See, e.g., Krohn, 490 Mich 145, Johnson, 492 Mich 169, Douglas, 492 Mich 241, and Wilcox v State Farm Mut Auto Ins Co, 488 Mich 930, 930-932 (2010) (CAVANAGH, J., dissenting). 4 forced to inject a variety of terms and phrases not found in the statutory language in an effort to “clarify” Griffith in its purported attempt to avoid an incremental approach to allowable expenses. The result is an overly narrow construction of the statute that is inconsistent with the Legislature’s intent regarding MCL 500.3107(1)(a). For example, the majority states that an “ordinary, everyday expense” cannot qualify as an allowable expense under MCL 500.3107(1)(a). However, the phrase “ordinary, everyday expense” is amorphous and, more importantly, absent from the statutory language. Rather, the statute simply provides that allowable expenses are “all reasonable charges incurred for reasonably necessary products, services and accommodations for an injured person’s care, recovery, or rehabilitation.” MCL 500.3107(1)(a) (emphasis added). In my view, “all reasonable charges” could encompass a so-called “ordinary, everyday expense” and thus satisfy MCL 500.3107(1)(a) if that expense is reasonable and reasonably necessary for the injured person’s welfare and protection. The majority also proclaims that “the new expense must be of a wholly different essential character than expenses borne by the person before the accident . . . .” Ante at 15 (emphasis added). Again, this undefined statement of what an insured must now show to be eligible for benefits finds no support in the statutes or caselaw. Moreover, the majority’s explanation of expenses that satisfy MCL 500.3107(1)(a) will not add clarity to this area of the law because the majority’s examples are not truly “of a wholly different essential character.” For instance, the majority states that a “custom shoe” would qualify as an allowable expense. However, no matter how much a shoe is customized or modified, it retains its “essential character” as a shoe, i.e., it protects a person’s foot while 5 walking. I question how the bench and bar are to apply the majority’s opinion consistently and fairly when the majority itself struggles to do so. Next, the majority attempts to draw a distinction between a “combined” product, which it deems insufficient to satisfy MCL 500.3107(1)(a), and an “integrated” product, which, according to the majority, does satisfy MCL 500.3107(1)(a).5 Again, that distinction does not appear in the statutory language, and the majority is unable to cite any support for its judicially created distinction. Moreover, the majority’s explanation of the difference between a “combined” product and an “integrated” product evidences that the majority’s approach is entirely standardless. Specifically, the majority defines a “combined” product as one that “can be separated easily, both conceptually and physically, so that the fact-finder can identify which costs are of a new character and are thus for the injured person’s care, recovery, or rehabilitation and which costs are ordinary, everyday expenses that are unchanged after the accident.” Ante at 16. Given the unique nature of modified products, however, this explanation provides little assistance to the bench and bar. Indeed, the majority concludes that “[w]hen a medical products company produces a custom shoe, the shoe is an integrated product because the medical nature of the shoe . . . cannot be separated from the ordinary need for shoes by an uninjured person.” Ante at 17-18. Presumably, the majority considers a “custom shoe” integrated because it cannot be separated 5 The majority also states that a product must be “truly integrated” to satisfy its interpretation of MCL 500.3107(1)(a), but the majority does not explain, and it is unclear to me, whether there is a difference between “combined,” “integrated,” and “truly integrated” products. 6 “conceptually or physically.” Yet, the majority reaches a different conclusion in this case despite the fact that, as explained later in this opinion, the same is true of plaintiff’s modified, or “custom,” van. In short, although the majority claims to reject the “incremental” approach used in Ward v Titan Ins Co, 287 Mich App 552; 791 NW2d 488 (2010), and Hoover v Mich Mut Ins Co, 281 Mich App 617; 761 NW2d 801 (2008), the majority implicitly adopts that very rule by defining the preinjury need too broadly while simultaneously defining an “integrated product” too narrowly. The majority’s further deviation from the clear statutory language will only perpetuate the confusion that began with the Griffith majority’s erroneous analysis.6