Court Opinion

ID: 9846145
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-09-24 03:35:41.013016+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T09:16:34.126923
License: Public Domain

BYBEE, Circuit Judge,
dissenting:
Fifteen years ago we certified a nearly identical question to the Arizona Supreme Court. See State Farm Mut. Auto. Ins. Co. v. Fatness, 39 F.3d 966, 967 (9th Cir.1994). We received an answer and we then issued an opinion in Fatness. Id.; State Farm Mut. Auto. Ins. Co. v. Fatness, 178 Ariz. 281, 872 P.2d 1233, 1234 (1994). Fatness is not in question in Arizona courts. Indeed, the Arizona Supreme Court has cited our Fatness decision with approval. See Philadelphia Indem. Ins. Co. v. Barerra, 200 Ariz. 9, 21 P.3d 395, 404 (2001) (en banc).
Here, the majority has certified nearly the same question again to the Arizona Supreme Court. There really isn’t much doubt how this case must be resolved after Fatness. Rather, we are certifying because we doubt the wisdom of Arizona’s application of its rule. In effect, we are inviting Arizona to revisit the reasonable expectations doctrine as applied to the named insured exclusion. I have my own doubts about the wisdom of the rule and its operation in Arizona, but I still don’t think there is any lack of “controlling precedent in the decisions of the [Arizona S]upreme [Cjourt and intermediate appellate courts” to justify our order. See ariz. Rev. Stat. § 12-1861. I respectfully dissent.