Court Opinion

ID: 9537109
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-07 07:12:36.682114+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T14:56:04.165557
License: Public Domain

BAKES, Justice
(dissenting):
I concur with Justice Donaldson and would follow the decision of this Court in Butterfield v. Western Casualty & Surety Co., 83 Idaho 79, 357 P.2d 944 (1960).
*52However, I further question the propriety of determining the key issue in the injured claimant’s case, i. e., whether or not the vehicle was being used with the permission of the insured, in a case other than the negligence action filed by the claimant. This Court, in Ennis v. Casey, 72 Idaho 181, 185, 238 P.2d 435 (1951), warned against the practice of permitting issues, which should be decided in the main action, from being determined in a declaratory judgment proceeding which preempts the main action. And while this Court stated in Temperance Insurance Exchange v. Carver, 83 Idaho 487, 365 P.2d 824 (1961):
“Where an insurer acts with reasonable promptness, so that the insured and third parties are not prejudiced, the insurer is entitled to have the question of the validity of its policy, and its liability thereunder, determined prior to the trial of an action against the insured upon a liability alleged to be covered by the policy, so that the insurer may know whether it is obligated to defend the insured as provided by the policy. (Citations omitted) .” 83 Idaho at 492, 365 P.2d 826,
actions such as that before the Court today point out the impropriety of this procedure and- how prejudice can possibly result. One effect is that the plaintiffs are forced to have the issue of permission determined not in their action in which the extent of their injuries is before the trier of fact, but in an action in which they are at best only one of several parties defendant. In this case you have the further complication in that the insureds, Leon and Fay Wright, were not even made parties to the action, raising the specter of inconsistent judgments in the two cases. I think the district courts should heed carefully the admonition of the Ennis case, supra, suggesting that critical issues such as the question of permission should ordinarily be decided in the main action, and not in the declaratory judgment action filed by the insured’s company.