Court Opinion

ID: 9851321
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-09-24 05:10:38.709002+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T09:20:53.462925
License: Public Domain

McMurray, Presiding Judge,
dissenting.
I respectfully dissent from the judgment of reversal as it is my view that the jury was authorized to conclude that the owner of the vehicle gave a general permission to use his car over a two- or three-week period and that any prohibition on going to Florida was intended solely to get the owner’s son (as well as the car) home from college for the Easter holiday. It is undisputed that the driver had no reason to know of any restrictions placed on the car’s use by the owner. Consequently, the second permittee doctrine renders the owner’s express restriction nugatory.
Faith Joy Segal was operating a Ford Escort owned by James Therrell III when she was involved in a vehicular mishap with Alan A. Walker and Nicole G. Walker. Prudential Property & Casualty Insurance Company (“Prudential”) brought this declaratory judgment action, contending Faith Joy Segal was not a covered driver under the terms of an automobile liability insurance policy Prudential issued to James Therrell III.
*87James Therrell III had temporarily loaned the Escort to his son, James Therrell IV, in order to move some of James Therrell IV’s belongings from the family home in Roswell, Georgia, to Statesboro, Georgia, where James Therrell IV was attending Georgia Southern University. James Therrell IV has his own vehicle but “he couldn’t get ... all [his things] in there, so he said, ‘Can I borrow the Escort?’ ” James Therrell IV was supposed to “bring the car back to [James Therrell III] in Roswell . . . Easter weekend.” Thus, James Therrell IV would have the car “two or three weeks.” James Therrell IV was also given two gasoline credit cards and a Discover charge card. On Friday, April 9, 1993, in Statesboro, James Therrell IV met Faith Joy Segal, a friend’s roommate. Faith Joy Segal “was crying, and her mother kept calling her and telling her how much she — she was terrible, you know, that she was not going to her brother’s wedding.” It seemed to James Therrell IV that “she had no other way to get there than somebody to let her use a car.” After being assured that Faith Joy Segal would be covered by her mother’s own automobile liability policy, James Therrell IV agreed to let Faith Joy Segal take his father’s Escort for one day and drive to Tallahassee, Florida, so she could be fitted for a bridesmaid’s dress. Faith Joy Segal gave James Therrell IV $100. This sum had been given to Faith Joy Segal by her mother to apply towards the cost of a round-trip bus ticket to Tallahassee from Statesboro. James Therrell IV insisted this money was only “given as a loan which I was going to pay back to her on Monday, but it was also used as collateral because she was taking my father’s car.”
James Therrell III had a longstanding household rule about loaning property: “The rule is that we — we don’t loan the property out, because invariably when something happens, the only compensation given back is I’m sorry. . . .” He also told James Therrell IV “the car was not to go to Florida. It wasn’t to go to Savannah. It was to come here [Statesboro] and get business taken care of or whatever he had to do here, and then bring it back to Roswell.” James Therrell III was certain that he had discussed loaning the car with his son prior to this trip, because “any time that we — we had a situation like that with Jimmy [James Therrell IV] I think we always stressed the situation that, ‘Jimmy, this is not to be loaned out.’ ” James Therrell III conceded, however, that when he gave James Therrell IV “permission to use the car, that [any fatherly] admonition [s] . . . about loaning the car and don’t go to Savannah . . . were not conditions of his use. . . .” James Therrell IV knew of the family rule although in this particular instance, he did not “remember him saying, ‘Do not let anybody borrow the car.’ ” “It was mainly on cars. Do not loan a car to anyone. ... I don’t remember him saying it at that point, but, . . . I knew that I was not supposed to loan anybody that car.” James *88Therrell IV told Faith Joy Segal “to be very careful because [his] father basically would kill me if he knew that she had borrowed the car.” On Saturday evening, Faith Joy Segal telephoned and said, “ ‘Look, Jimmy, I’m really sorry. I’m in a hospital. I’ve wrecked your car. It’s totalled.’ ”
The case was tried before a jury which answered a special interrogatory and found “that Faith Joy Segal did have permission to drive the Therrell vehicle at the time in question.” Prudential appeals from the judgment declaring it is obliged “under its policy to provide a defense to Faith Joy Segal and to pay up to the policy limits any judgment or amounts . . . owed by [her] to Alan A. Walker and/or Nicole G. Walker.”
The denial of Prudential’s motion for directed verdict, on the issue of whether Ms. Segal was a permissive driver, is Prudential’s first enumeration of error. The Prudential policy defined an “Insured” in the following language: “You and a resident relative are insured. . . . Other people are insured while using your car ... if you give them permission to use it. They must use the car in the way you intended.” The policy elsewhere defines “you” and “your” to be the named insured, i.e., James Therrell III or his spouse. Prudential argues that Faith Joy Segal was not a permissive driver under the express terms of the policy because she did not have the permission of James Therrell III or his spouse. This contention is without merit.
“ ‘The term “permission” is universally held to mean either express or implied permission.’ Hodges v. Ocean Acc. &c. Corp., 66 Ga. App. 431, 435 (18 SE2d 28).” Hemphill v. Home Ins. Co., 121 Ga. App. 323, 330 (2), 332 (174 SE2d 251). This Court recently applied the “second permittee doctrine” to identical policy language as was employed by Prudential and held liability coverage was afforded despite the owner’s express prohibition against consuming alcohol in the car, allowing others to consume alcohol in the car, or allowing others to drive the vehicle. “ ‘In essence, the permission to use . . . clause refers to the purpose for which the permission was given and not the [manner of] operation of the vehicle [or the identity of the driver]. Thus, where a third person utilizes a vehicle via another person who did have permission from the owner, the fact that such third person had neither express nor implied permission from the owner is irrelevant. So is the fact the third person had no license to drive or was expressly forbidden to drive by the owner. “(T)he policy only requires permission for the purpose to be served.” (Cits.) As long as the [second permittee’s] use falls within the scope of the [original] permission then it is permissive within the policy terminology.’ In this case, the relevant inquiries therefore are: (1) whether [James Therrell Ill’s] permission to the first permittee, [James Therrell IV], included using *89the vehicle [to run errands with school friends]; and (2) if the scope of the permission [Faith Joy Segal, the second permittee] received from [James Therrell IV, the first permittee] exceeded the permission [James Therrell IV] had from [James Therrell III, the owner].” (Emphasis omitted.) Allstate Ins. Co. v. Wood, 211 Ga. App. 662, 663 (1) (440 SE2d 78), applying Ga. Farm Bureau Mut. Ins. Co. v. Allstate Ins. Co., 190 Ga. App. 593 (1), 594 (379 SE2d 619). In the case sub judice, the undisputed fact that James Therrell III had never given Faith Joy Segal permission to use the vehicle does not address the relevant inquiry. The scope of James Therrell Ill’s permission to James Therrell IV over the two or three weeks he would have the car was to get “business taken care of or whatever he had to do . . .” and be back in Roswell over Easter weekend. This was a general permission that did not preclude a helpful gesture on behalf of a school friend. Furthermore, while it is true that James Therrell III told James Therrell IV not to take the car to Florida or Savannah, he affirmed that the purpose of his territorial restrictions “had to do with getting [James Therrell IV] home at Easter and being with [his] mother at Easter break,” because that was important to her. Accordingly, when James Therrell IV let Faith Joy Segal take the car to Florida on a weekend before the Easter weekend, the purpose of James Therrell Ill’s travel restrictions was not defeated thereby, even though that trip to Florida was arguably in defiance of James Therrell Ill’s express prohibition.1 Since we cannot say as a matter of law that Faith Joy Segal exceeded the scope of James Therrell Ill’s permission to his son, a jury question was presented as to the precise parameters of that scope of permission. See Ga. Farm Bureau Mut. Ins. Co. v. Allstate Ins. Co., 190 Ga. App. 593 (1), 594, supra. Compare DeWorken v. State Farm &c. Ins. Co., 151 Ga. App. 248 (259 SE2d 490). In DeWorken, “it was undisputed that both the son and the friend to whom the son loaned the [father’s] vehicle knew that no one other than the son was allowed to drive the car. . . . [This Court] held that the friend was not an insured under [that] policy because[, unlike Prudential’s policy in the case sub judice,] it ‘required that an *90additional insured both use and operate the vehicle with the permission of the named insured or his spouse.’ [Cit.]” (Emphasis in original.) Transp. Ins. Co. v. Allstate Ins. Co., 208 Ga. App. 837, 839 (2), 840 (432 SE2d 259) (physical precedent). In the case sub judice, Prudential admits in its brief that Faith Joy “Segal was not aware of any restriction on James [Therrell IV’s] use of his father’s car.” The absence of express permission from James Therrell III is not germane to the proper inquiry under the “second permittee doctrine.” Consequently, the trial court did not err in denying Prudential’s motion for directed verdict on the basis that Faith Joy Segal did not get permission personally from James Therrell III or his spouse. As my colleagues in the majority would nevertheless reverse that correct determination of the trial court, I respectfully dissent.
Decided November 16, 1995
Karsman, Brooks & Calloway, Ralph K. Riddle, for appellant.
Barrow, Sims, Morrow & Lee, A. Mark Lee, Thompson, Fox, Chandler, Homans & Hicks, Catherine H. Hicks, J. Converse Bright, for appellees.
I am authorized to state that Chief Judge Beasley and Judge Blackburn join in this dissent.

 The majority erroneously asserts that Faith Joy Segal’s use of the car “bore no relation to the purpose for which [James Therrell IV] borrowed [the car because he] needed it to transport his belongings back to school.” (Majority, ante, p. 86). This analysis mistakenly focuses on the subjective intent of the borrower rather than the revealed intent of the lender. Moreover, this mistaken analysis is contradicted by the testimony of the father, James Therrell III, who gave permission to his son to use the car to “get business taken care of or whatever he had to do.” (Emphasis supplied.) For all intents and purposes, the father’s car was intended by both parties to be a substitute for the son’s vehicle, with the exception that James Therrell IV was not to take the car to Florida during the Easter break. Neither father nor son anticipated that the vehicle, once unloaded of the son’s belongings, would sit parked by the side of the road, idle, empty, and unused, during the two or three weeks that James Therrell IV would remain in Statesboro before returning home for Easter.