Court Opinion

ID: 9588552
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-21 23:35:36.705205+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T18:00:59.519316
License: Public Domain

Chief Justice Billings
dissenting in part.
If the motor vehicle liability policy provides coverage in this case because the accident arose out of the use of the insured’s motor vehicle, then I fail to understand how a homeowner’s policy that specifically excludes from coverage bodily injury arising out of the use of a motor vehicle owned by the insured can be construed to provide coverage. To me, this is not a matter of “liberal” versus “strict” construction of insurance policies; we are merely asked to apply common sense to words chosen to prevent exactly what the majority determines is the result in the case sub judice. The exclusion in the homeowner’s policy unmistakably notifies the insured that coverage is not provided if the liability arises out of the use of a motor vehicle owned by an insured. While there may be some ambiguity about whether under the circumstances the insured’s liability arose out of the use of the insured’s vehicle, once it is established either that the liability did or did not arise out of that use, the terms and therefore the reach of neither policy are ambiguous.
I agree with Justice Mitchell’s analysis of the coverage provided by the Nationwide Mutual Insurance Company’s motor vehicle liability policy and therefore would hold that coverage is not provided by that policy. I disagree with Justice Mitchell in his conclusion that the State Capital Insurance Company’s homeowner’s policy does not provide coverage. As indicated above, since the accident did not arise out of the use of the motor vehicle, the exclusion contained in the other policy excluding coverage for liability arising out of the use of the motor vehicle does not apply. The only remaining question is whether the exclusion for liability arising out of the “loading or unloading” of a motor vehicle owned by an insured excludes the liability in the case sub judice.
*551The correct resolution of the question of coverage under the homeowner’s policy is the construction of the word “unloading.” If “unloading” is construed to mean the removal of any item from the vehicle, then the exclusion applies and coverage is not provided. If, however, the word is construed to mean the removal from the vehicle of cargo,1 defined as “the lading or freight of a ship, airplane, or vehicle,”2 the transportation of which is the primary purpose for which the vehicle was being used,3 then the exclusion does not apply to the removal of the rifle from the vehicle in the case sub judice. Giving to the words “loading and unloading” the more restrictive construction, I would hold that the accident did not arise out of the insured’s “unloading” of the vehicle and that the exclusion in the homeowner’s policy does not apply. I would hold that the State Capital Insurance Company’s policy alone provides coverage.

. See the definition of “unload” in Webster’s Third New International Dictionary 2508 (1961).

. Id. at 339.

. See the cases cited in the majority opinion. Note especially Casualty Co. v. Insurance Co., 16 N.C. App. 194, 192 S.E. 2d 113, cert. denied, 282 N.C. 425, 192 S.E. 2d 840 (1972) (truck’s three 500 gallon tanks were being loaded with pressurized anhydrous ammonia).