Court Opinion

ID: 9814595
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-31 23:57:46.205361+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T15:42:01.511723
License: Public Domain

KAREN NELSON MOORE, Circuit Judge,
concurring in the judgment.
I concur in the judgment but write separately to explain the grounds on which I would uphold the district court’s grant of summary judgment to State Farm. Rather than rely on an issue that the district court did not address and the parties did not brief on appeal, I would instead affirm on the grounds that Stine failed to come forward with evidence of the second element of the bad-faith claim, rather than the third. The undisputed facts in this case made coverage fairly debatable and gave State Farm a reasonable basis to deny Stine’s claim. Stine offered no evidence of how State Farm otherwise failed to “debate the matter fairly.” Farmland Mut. Ins. Co. v. Johnson, 36 S.W.3d 368, 375 (Ky.2000). I therefore agree that State Farm was entitled to summary judgment.