Opinion ID: 1862544
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 2

Heading: summary judgment denying punitive damages

Text: The circuit judge erred in granting American Public a summary judgment on the issue of punitive damages. This matter should have been deferred until both sides had completed presentation of their evidence at trial. Again, viewing the record in favor of Crawley, we find evidence from which the jury could conclude: 1. The denial of Crawley's claim was not a clerical error but a deliberate choice made by executives of American Public. 2. American Public had a system of selling insurance which encouraged agents to be over-eager in their sales pitches. They were commission compensated, and their commissions came primarily, if not altogether from the first premium payments. They received higher commissions on family than on individual coverage. 3. The selling agents either did not know any better, or deliberately misrepresented that the Crawley children would be covered. American Public had some responsibility for soliciting agents who recklessly or deliberately made material misrepresentations. 4. The American Public form application for insurance along with its policy which stated it was a family policy, and at the same time limiting coverage by one phrase in the body of the policy could very well have been calculated to do precisely what American Public did in this case, collect premiums for which it assumed no risk. Its agents could tell any policyholder his children were covered while collecting premiums, only to have American Public deny coverage when a child was hospitalized with a dread disease. Shell games are for carnivals, not the insurance industry. 5. The coverage was in a limited, and relatively small, amount thus enabling American Public to better play the odds, because many policyholders, rather than go to the expense of a trial, would simply abandon their claims. Small, limited coverage health and accident insurance policies afford fertile ground for shell game coverage. Whether there was a widespread practice of treating other policyholders as Crawley was treated was information that American Public, upon request for discovery, should have been required to reveal. [4] In numerous cases this Court has had its say about when and under what circumstances punitive damages are appropriate, reiterated at length in Andrew Jackson Life Ins. Co. v. Williams, 566 So.2d 1172 (Miss. 1990). In this instance we need no further fine tuning as to punitive damages because this is not a borderline, but instead a bull's eye case. What does an insurance company owe its policyholders and those it induces to become policyholders? First, simple, open honesty and fair dealing in taking reasonable steps to be certain that the insured is not being misled as to his coverage, but understands it; and second, an insurance company, just like everybody else, should pay its bills in full when they are due. The law of this state requires no more; neither will it tolerate less. In Andrew Jackson, 566 So.2d at 1189, we quoted from a decision of the California Supreme Court eighty years ago: It is a matter almost of common knowledge that a very small percentage of policy holders [sic] are actually cognizant of the provisions of their policies and many of them are ignorant of the names of the companies issuing the said policies. The policies are prepared by the experts of the companies, they are highly technical in their phraseology, they are complicated and voluminous . .. and in their numerous conditions and stipulations furnishing what may be veritable traps for the unwary... . [C]ourts, while zealous to uphold legal contracts, should not sacrifice the spirit to the letter nor should they be slow to aid the confiding and innocent. (Emphasis original) Raulet v. Northwestern Nat'l Ins. Co. of Milwaukee, 157 Cal. 213, 230, 107 P. 292, 298 (1910). For the reasons stated, we reverse the granting of summary judgment both on actual and punitive damages and remand for proceedings consistent with this opinion. REVERSED AND REMANDED. ROY NOBLE LEE, C.J., DAN M. LEE, P.J., and PRATHER, ROBERTSON, SULLIVAN, PITTMAN, BANKS and McRAE, JJ., concur. McRAE, J., specially concurs with separate written opinion joined by DAN M. LEE, P.J., and SULLIVAN and BANKS, JJ.