Court Opinion

ID: 9621791
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-22 06:07:17.479265+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T13:12:44.366515
License: Public Domain

UDALL, Justice
(dissenting).
I respectfully dissent from the court’s opinion, for the reason that I do not consider there to have been a sufficient relation between any actual unloading of the truck and the accident involved.
At the time the gun fired, it was merely lying in the truck. According to Hallabrin it fired the moment he grabbed it, even before he had begun to lift it. The accident could have occurred whether the gun was lying in a tent, on the ground or on a closet shelf. It could have occurred if at the time of the accident Hallabrin had merely intended to move the gun to a different part of the truck rather than remove it from the truck. Under such circumstances no question of “loading or unloading” could be raised. Moreover, had Hallabrin grabbed the gun while he and his friends were traveling in the truck, the “homeowners” policy would afford coverage. Brenner v. Aetna Insurance Co., 8 Ariz.App. 272, 445 P.2d 474 (1968).
In my view the facts in this case are not sufficiently related to the use of the truck to remove the accident from coverage under the “homeowners” policy.
*541The Supreme Court of California has státed as follows in Entz v. Fidelity & Casualty Company of New York, 64 Cal.2d 379, 50 Cal.Rptr. 190, 412 P.2d 382 (1966):
“The question, however, is not whether the accident occurred during the unloading, but, rather, whether the injury arose out of the use of the vehicle.
“Although the vehicle need not be, in the legal sense, a proximate cause of the injury, the events giving rise to the claim must arise out of, and be related to, its use. 50 Cal.Rptr. at 195, 412 P.2d at 387.”
The majority opinion holds that the instant accident is excluded from the coverage of the homeowners’ policy because the accident was “connected” with the unloading. The majority opinion quotes 7 Am. Jur.2d 397, 398, which states that there “must be a connection between the accident and the use of the vehicle insured.” Yet the preceding sentence, 7 Am.Jur.2d, 397, states as follows:
“An accident is causally connected with the process of loading or unloading only if the loading or unloading was the efficient or predominating cause of the accident.” [Emphasis supplied]
I am thus unable to agree that a mere connection with unloading of the truck is sufficient to bring this accident within the exclusionary provisions of the homeowners policy. It is true that courts in some “extreme” situations have held that accidents “arose out of loading or unloading” within the inclusionary provisions of automobile policies.1 However, in several of such cases cited by the majority, the courts so held only after expressly stating that the policy should be liberally interpreted in favor of the insured. Allstate Insurance Co. v. Valdez, 190 F.Supp. 893 (E.D.Mich. 1961); Raffel v. Travelers Indemnity Co., 141 Conn. 389, 106 A.2d 716 (1954); Columbia Southern Chemical Corp. v. Manufacturers and Wholesalers Indemnity Exchange, 190 Cal.App.2d 194, 11 Cal.Rptr. 762. “It has long been the rule that in construing an insurance policy, any uncertainty or ambiguity in the policy issued by an insurer must be construed most strongly against such insurer and in favor of the insured.” Columbia Southern Chemical Corp. v. Manufacturers and Wholesalers Indemnity Exchange, supra, 11 Cal.Rptr. at 767. I do not believe that such “extreme cases”, holding that coverage existed, are persuasive authority for the court’s holding in this case, which denies coverage to the insured.

. On the other hand, in General Accident Fire and Life Assurance Corp. v. Brown, 35 Ill.App.2d 43, 181 N.E.2d 191 (1962), also cited by the majority, the court held that an accident did not arise out of “loading and unloading” of a truck. There the accident occurred when the injured party, while carrying two lamps to load in a truck, slipped and fell between the loading ramp and the truck. It cannot be said that the standards to be applied in cases such as these are free from uncertainty.