Court Opinion

ID: 9590302
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-21 23:53:40.025083+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T09:13:39.267446
License: Public Domain

Banke, Presiding Judge.
This is an appeal from a summary judgment entered in favor of the appellee, State Farm Fire & Casualty Company, in a declaratory judgment action brought to determine its obligation to defend an- insured in an action arising out of the insured’s sexual molestation of the appellants’ minor daughter. The trial court determined as a matter of law that the policy language excluded coverage for the child’s injuries.
It is undisputed that the child was repeatedly molested by the insured while she was between seven and ten years of age. At times she was enticed to submit to his will by offers of candy or threats that nude photographs taken of her would be shown to her friends. The insured ultimately pled guilty to the offenses of child molestation and enticing a child for indecent purposes, following which the appellants *369presented a “Memorandum of Claim” to the appellee, seeking to recover damages for the insured’s conduct. Thereafter, the appellee brought the present declaratory judgment action seeking a determination that it had no obligation in the matter, due to a policy exclusion pertaining to bodily injury “expected or intended by the insured.”
In deposition testimony, the insured asserted that he had not intended to injure the girl; and it is on the basis of this testimony that the appellants contend that the policy exclusion does not apply. The insurer, on the other hand, argues that the insured, by the very nature of his acts, must be presumed to have acted with the knowledge and expectation that his conduct would result in injury to the child, regardless of his actual, subjective state of mind. Held:
“The general rule which appears to have developed through judicial interpretation and application of exclusionary provisions such as the one in the instant case is that they are inapplicable if and only if the insured acts without the intent or expectation of causing any injury, however slight. Conversely, such an exclusion is applicable if the insured acts with the intent or expectation that bodily injury occur, even if the actual, resulting injury is different either in kind or magnitude from that intended or expected.” Colonial Penn Ins. Co. v. Hart, 162 Ga. App. 333, 335 (291 SE2d 410) (1982).
The statutes prohibiting child molestation (OCGA § 16-6-4) and enticement of children for indecent purposes (OCGA § 16-6-5) were promulgated by the Legislature as part of a general statutory scheme to protect children under the age of 14 from physical and psychological damage resulting from sexual exploitation. See Barnes v. State, 244 Ga. 302, 304-305 (260 SE2d 40) (1979). In adopting this legislation, the Legislature made the common-sense recognition that inherent in every such act is the element of harm. Based on the undisputed facts disclosed by the record in this case, it is clear that if the insured did not actively intend harm to the appellants’ daughter, he was at the very least consciously indifferent to the consequences of his conduct upon her. We conclude that he must be presumed under such circumstances to have intended those injuries which naturally and unavoidably flowed from his criminal misconduct, with the result that his assertion that he did not subjectively intend to cause injury to the girl “does not demonstrate any unintended consequences of an intentional act so as to avoid application of the policy exclusion.” Antill v. State Farm Fire &c. Co., 178 Ga. App. 659 (344 SE2d 480) (1986). To conclude otherwise would be to allow any insured to defeat such a policy exclusion, no matter how heinous his mistreatment of the injured person, simply by stating that he had no subjective intention of causing the injury but desired merely to satisfy an inner urge. Accordingly, we hold that the exclusion in the subject policy is applicable and that the trial court did not err in granting the appellee’s motion *370for summary judgment.

Judgment affirmed.

Birdsong, C. J., Deen, P. J., Carley, Sognier, and Benham, JJ., concur. McMurray, P. J., Pope and Beasley, JJ., dissent.