Court Opinion

ID: 9566341
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-21 19:37:33.78123+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T09:37:12.855420
License: Public Domain

Justice MEYER
dissenting.
I dissent from the majority opinion.
Plaintiff in this case, Jimmy Harrington, is an adult who has children of his own. Neither his father nor his brother, with whom plaintiff is staying temporarily, had any legal obligation to support him or to pay his medical expenses. Following his separation from his wife barely a month before he was injured, he had moved into his father’s home, which was immediately next door, but during that entire time, he was “temporarily” living with his girlfriend and, in fact, had spent only a few nights in his father’s house. His brother Ricky was also separated from his wife and had been living with his father for about seven months.
In Harris v. Nationwide Mut. Ins. Co., 332 N.C. 184, 420 S.E.2d 124 (1992), in which I and others dissented, this Court held that the class one insured minor daughter of the policy owners was entitled to receive stacked benefits. Michelle Harris was entitled to intrapolicy stacking not just because she was a class one insured person, not solely because she was the daughter of the policy owners, and not because she was a minor. The nonowner minor plaintiff in Harris was entitled to stack UIM benefits under her parents’ policy because her receipt of such benefits provided a direct, identifiable, cognizable, and real benefit to her parents, the policy owners. Thus, Harris holds that nonowner class one insureds are entitled to stack when such stacking provides benefit to the policy owner.
The majority in Harris declined to decide whether the insured was “correct in interpreting the statute to mean that only ‘owners’ are intended to benefit from the stacking of UIM coverages” but held that the plaintiff, a nonowner class one insured person, was entitled to stack because, the policy owners did, in fact, benefit *594by allowing the nonowner plaintiff to stack. Id. at 193, 420 S.E.2d at 129-30. The Harris opinion goes no further than to say that stacking is allowed for nonowner class one insureds when it benefits the policy owner.
In Harris, the minor plaintiff was dependent on her parents, the policy owners, for her support. The policy owners had a legal duty to support their child to the best of their abilities, and purchasing insurance to cover their daughter fulfilled part of their support duties. Moreover, purchasing insurance for their daughter served to reduce their potential personal financial obligation should their minor daughter be injured in an automobile accident.
Even as a nonowner class one insured, plaintiff here should not be allowed to interpolicy or intrapolicy stack because neither his father nor his brother will receive a real, cognizable benefit by allowing plaintiff to recover and stack the coverages on their policies along with the coverage he has already received pursuant to his own policy. Plaintiff was in no way dependent on either his father or his brother for support. The facts show that neither was providing support for the plaintiff. Plaintiff had moved his belongings to his father’s house for storage and perhaps had spent a few nights in his father’s household at his new permanent address. During the four weeks and four days that passed from the time plaintiff separated from his wife until the date of the accident, he had spent “several weeks” living, not in his father’s house, but in another county with his girlfriend. Neither his father nor his brother had any legal obligation to provide for plaintiff’s support. Therefore, there is no real and direct benefit to those policy owners, when plaintiff is allowed to recover and stack benefits under their policies.
Chief Justice Exum and Justice Parker join in this dissenting opinion.