Opinion ID: 1190369
Heading Depth: 1
Heading Rank: 6

Heading: Insurance Contract.

Text: Parties to an insurance contract are free to bargain for coverage greater than that mandated by statute, unless contrary to public policy. See Stamper, 732 P.2d at 536. The public policy prohibition against procuring liability insurance for intentional misconduct is not applicable in this context. UM insurance is a form of casualty, rather than liability insurance. 3 Rowland H. Long, The Law of Liability Insurance § 24.02 (1991). Accordingly, we look to the USAA policy to determine whether the casualty which befell Ulrich is among the risks which the parties reasonably intended to be covered by the UM provision of their contract. 6B Appleman, supra § 4317. The UM provision of the USAA policy provides: We will pay compensatory damages which a covered person is legally entitled to recover from the owner or operator of an uninsured motor vehicle because of BI [bodily injury] sustained by a covered person and caused by an accident. The owner's or operator's liability for these damages must arise out of the ownership, maintenance or use of the uninsured motor vehicle. The parties do not dispute that Ulrich was a covered person within the meaning of the policy; that he would legally be entitled to recover from Stallings for his injuries; that Stallings' vehicle was uninsured; or that Ulrich's injuries, when viewed from his perspective, were accidentally incurred. The sole matter at issue is whether Ulrich's injuries ar[o]se out of the ownership, maintenance or use of Stallings' uninsured motor vehicle. In Worthington v. State, 598 P.2d 796 (Wyo.1979), this court set forth an analysis for construing an arising out of the ownership, maintenance or use clause in a liability insurance policy which we believe is equally applicable to the same or similar clause of an UM insurance provision. The Worthington case originated from an automobile accident which occurred on a state highway that had been recently resurfaced. Mark Scott had been traveling eastbound on the highway when his vehicle broke down, forcing him to pull off onto the highway's shoulder. Kelly Worthington, noticing Scott's predicament, pulled nose-to-nose with the Scott vehicle to illuminate the area while Scott tried to fix his vehicle. As Scott was standing between the two vehicles and Worthington was seated in her vehicle, the Scott vehicle was hit from behind by Edward Malar, a partially blind motorist. The impact propelled the Scott vehicle into the Worthington vehicle. Scott lost both legs as a result of being pinched between the vehicles; Worthington sustained a severe neck injury which led to total paralysis. Malar explained that a dust storm, coupled with the lack of road lines, caused him to wander off the road and collide with the Scott vehicle. Scott and Worthington, the plaintiffs, filed separate lawsuits against the state of Wyoming to recover damages for their injuries. They asserted that the state had waived immunity from suit to the extent that it held liability insurance and that their injuries fell within the purview of such insurance. The state's insurance policy obligated the carrier: To pay on behalf of the insured all sums which the insured shall become legally obligated to pay as damages because of (A) bodily injury sustained by other persons, and (B) property damage, caused by accident arising out of the ownership, maintenance or use, including loading or unloading, of the owned motor vehicle. Worthington, 598 P.2d at 805-06 (emphasis in original). The plaintiffs argued that, because state owned vehicles were used to obliterate the road lines and because the nonexistence of road lines was a contributing cause of the accident, their injuries ar[ose] out of the use of the state owned vehicles. The court, rejecting the plaintiffs' reasoning, set forth the following analysis: The primary objective of interpreting an insurance contract is to ascertain what the parties reasonably intended as its object and to ascribe to the terms used their plain, ordinary and customary meaning in order to effectuate the intent of the parties. When there are any ambiguities or uncertainties in the meaning of the language used in a policy, they must be strictly construed against the insured who drafted the contract. However, if the language is clear and unambiguous, there is no room for the court to resort to a strict construction against the insurer, and the insurance policy must be interpreted according to the ordinary and the usual meaning of its terms. Worthington, 598 P.2d at 806 (citations omitted). Applying the foregoing rules of contract construction, the court determined that the arising out of clause unambiguously expressed the parties' intent that liability coverage existed for injuries which resulted as a natural consequence from the use of an insured vehicle. The court then expounded upon what has been coined the natural consequences test as follows: In determining whether an injury arose out of use, the evidence must demonstrate that it was the natural and reasonable incident or consequence of the use of an insured vehicle, the causal connection being reasonably apparent. If the injury was directly caused by some independent or intervening cause wholly disassociated from, independent of or remote from the use of the automobile, the injury cannot be held to arise out of its use. The resolution of the question necessarily depends to a great degree upon the particular facts presented by each individual case. Worthington, 598 P.2d at 807 (citations omitted). The Worthington court applied the natural consequences test to the facts of the case to conclude that the plaintiffs' injuries did not fall within the risks reasonably covered by the state's liability insurance contract. The court noted that intervening acts of negligence rendered any causal connection between the state-owned vehicles and the plaintiff's injuries legally remote. Worthington, 598 P.2d at 809. Before we apply the natural consequences test to the instant case, it is necessary that we address Ulrich's contention that the some nexus analysis applied in General Acc. Ins. Co. of Am. v. Olivier, 574 A.2d 1240 (R.I.1990), best reflects the parties' intent regarding the scope of coverage provided by UM insurance. The some nexus test basically provides that, absent an express provision to the contrary, UM coverage will be found when there exists some nexus between the operation, maintenance or use of an uninsured motor vehicle and the injury to the insured. In Olivier, an uninsured motorist was involved in a fender-bender with a vehicle in which Olivier was a passenger. As the police were conducting a post-accident investigation, the enraged uninsured motorist intentionally shot and killed Olivier as she stood along the roadside. The Rhode Island Supreme Court, relying almost exclusively upon the some nexus case of Gov't Employees Ins. Co. v. Novak, 453 So.2d 1116 (Fla.1984), held that there existed a sufficient nexus between the accident and the shooting to find that Olivier's death arose out of the use of an uninsured motor vehicle. Olivier, 574 A.2d at 1243. We find the minority approach of Olivier to be unpersuasive for several reasons. First, Olivier is factually distinguishable in that the accident was the sole cause of the assailant's fervor. In the case at hand, Stallings was primarily, if not exclusively, upset about the physical altercation that had taken place at the Cowboy Bar. Second, the Novak case relied upon by the Olivier court was not a UM coverage case, but rather was a personal injury protection (PIP) insurance case. In Race v. Nationwide Mut. Fire Ins. Co., 542 So.2d 347 (Fla.1989), the Florida Supreme Court identified the differences between UM and PIP insurance and specifically rejected an invitation to interject the Novak some nexus analysis into the UM context. Third, and most importantly, because the use of an automobile has some nexus to almost any action undertaken in society, it is our persuasion that the test does not accurately reflect the intent of the parties regarding the scope of UM coverage. See Gilbertson v. State Farm Mut. Auto. Ins., 845 F.2d 245, 248 (10th Cir.1988). Ulrich also urges this court to follow the analysis in Wyoming Farm Bureau Mut. Insur. Co. v. State Farm Mut. Auto. Ins. Co., 467 F.2d 990 (10th Cir.1972). The Farm Bureau court applied essentially a but for test to an arising out of clause of a liability insurance contract to find that coverage existed for a pedestrian who was injured by shattering glass from a bottle which was thrown from a passing vehicle. We believe that the but for test suffers from the same deficiency as the some nexus test, i.e., it is overly broad. Consequently, we adhere to the analysis set forth in Worthington, as it, and not Farm Bureau, is the definitive expression of Wyoming law in this area. Consistent with Worthington, we hold that the aris[ing] out of clause of the parties' UM insurance provision unambiguously expresses their intent that coverage extend for those injuries which occur as a natural consequence of the use of an uninsured motor vehicle. [4] Applying the natural consequences test to this case, we conclude the obvious: Ulrich's injuries did not occur as a natural consequence of the use of Stallings' uninsured motor vehicle, but rather occurred as a natural consequence of Stallings' intentional use of a loaded firearm. Stallings' intentional act of shooting was an independent, intervening cause of Ulrich's injuries which rendered Stallings' use of his uninsured motor vehicle legally insignificant. [5] Consequently, we hold that Ulrich's injuries did not arise out of the ownership, maintenance or use of an uninsured motor vehicle as required by the UM provision of his USAA liability insurance policy. [6] As we ended our analysis in Worthington, we end our analysis here: The scope of coverage afforded by the type of insuring clause in question must end at some point, and this case represents a point well-beyond the line that must reasonably be drawn. Worthington, 598 P.2d at 809 (citing Asso. Independent Dealers, Inc. v. Mutual Serv. Ins. Cos., 304 Minn. 179, 229 N.W.2d 516, 519 (1975)).