Court Opinion

ID: 9686467
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-24 15:49:45.956933+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T09:44:00.589946
License: Public Domain

HUSPENI, Judge
(dissenting).
I respectfully dissent. The majority agrees, as do I, that appellant should have been permitted to intervene. However, the majority concludes (after observing that the right of intervention is for the purpose of protecting appellant’s statutory right of subrogation if and when it arises) that because Gruman received no double recovery, appellant has no subrogation claim. That analysis, I submit, results in placing appellant in an impossible situation. This panel defends appellant’s right to intervene; the Milbrandt court, in a footnote, advises that even though the issue of denial of intervention had not been appealed, intervention should have, in fact, been granted. Mil-brandt, 372 N.W.2d at 704 n. 1. The court in Miller reversed the trial court’s denial of the insurer’s motion to intervene. Why do appellate courts protect with such vigor an insurer’s right to intervene if, in fact, that right is as hollow as the majority seems to deem it? What right does an insurer pursue upon intervention? Is it not the right to assure that its insured collects total damages due from the tortfeasor, so that the insurer may then recover from its insured to the extent its insured has received a double recovery? I submit that the court in Miller had such a possibility in mind when it wrote:
The second requirement for intervention of right is that the applicant must be “so situated that the disposition of the action may as a practical matter impair or impede his ability to protect that interest, unless the applicant’s interest is adequately represented by existing parties.” Minn.Stat. § 65B.53, subd. 3 (1982) limits an insurer’s right of subrogation to amounts necessary to prevent a double recovery by the injured person. Minn. Stat. § 65B.51, subd. 1 (1982) requires that when injury is motor vehicle related in no-fault terms, no-fault benefits paid must be deducted from any tort recovery. Application of the offset provisions of § 65B.51 is, of course, in [the tort-feasor’s] interest. Deduction of the value of basic economic loss benefits from any recovery to which the [insureds] are entitled may, however, destroy [insurer’s] asserted subrogation right. The [insureds], on the other hand, have no incentive to resist application of the offset provisions, for recovery of the value of basic economic loss benefits would simply expose them to [insurer’s] claim for reimbursement. Consequently, it appears that [insurer’s] interest will be adequately protected only by intervention.
Miller, 332 N.W.2d at 655.
If appellant had been permitted to intervene, it would have been a party to this action. Perhaps it would have successfully protected its interests through participation in the ensuing arbitration. Perhaps it would have failed and the arbitrator may have entered an award identical to the one it actually did enter. However as a party, appellant could then have requested a trial pursuant to Rule 5.12 of the Special Rules for the Fourth Judicial District. Thus, any error of law in the arbitrator’s award *504would have been subject to correction upon trial.
I agree with the majority that the scope of review of an arbitrator’s award is narrow. However, this matter should never have proceeded to arbitration without appellant. The majority, by agreeing that appellant should have been permitted to intervene, in effect concedes the point. I cannot accept as sound any legal analysis which strands a party (or one who admittedly should have been a party) in a position such as appellant here occupies.
I would reverse.