Court Opinion

ID: 9700142
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-25 21:12:40.478159+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T13:07:49.202265
License: Public Domain

HESTER, Judge,
concurring in part and dissenting in part:
I respectfully dissent in part and concur in part.
The instant appeal raises a unique issue of first impression heretofore unresolved by the Appellate Courts of this Commonwealth.
The factual posture is as follows:
A motor vehicle collision occurred between an automobile operated by Appellant, John J. Zagari, and another operated by Appellee on December 31, 1976, after the effective date *249of the Pennsylvania No-Fault Motor Vehicle Insurance Act, Act of 1974, July 19, 1974, P.L. 489, No. 176, 40 P.S., Section 1009.101, etc. Appellant, Christie Zagari, is the wife of Appellant, John J. Zagari, but was not present at the time of the accident.
Thereafter, Appellants filed a Complaint in Trespass on October 24, 1977. After being properly served, Appellee filed Preliminary Objections in the Nature of Demurrer, or, in the alternative, a Motion to Strike certain sub-paragraphs contained in Appellants’ Complaint.
The Court of Common Pleas of Allegheny County, by The Honorable Silvestri Silvestri, sustained Appellee’s Motion to Strike and struck sub-paragraphs 8(a), (b), (g), (h), and 11(a), (c), of Appellants’ Complaint, which, as pled, provided inter alia:
8. Solely as a direct and proximate result of Defendant’s negligence and reckless conduct, as aforesaid, Plaintiff has sustained the following damages:
a. Plaintiff has accumulated and will continue to accumulate reasonable and necessary medical expenses for doctors fees and therapeutic treatments, the reasonable value of which is in excess of Seven Hundred and Fifty Dollars ($750.00);
b. Plaintiff has had to purchase a neck brace and home traction machine;
g. Plaintiff was attending Duquesne University Law School at the time of the accident and because of his injuries was unable to study properly for his final examinations causing poor grades, anxiety, embarrassment, and the necessity of repeating a year of law school;
h. Plaintiff’s general contracting business suffered financial set backs and continues to be adversely affected by Plaintiff’s inability to personally take part in construction work. In particular, bids have been lost or let go, a foreman and additional workers have had to be hired and Plaintiff’s expertise in laying bricks, a skilled craft, has been lost to the business.
*25011. Solely as a direct and proximate result of Defendant’s negligence and reckless conduct, as aforesaid, Plaintiff, Christie Zagari, has sustained the following damages:
a. Plaintiff has lost consortium;
c. Plaintiff lost the pecuniary value of her husband’s services for the period of time he was recuperating from the accident.
On December 20, 1977, Judge Silvestri issued an amended Order of Court acknowledging that despite the fact that his prior Order was interlocutory in nature, an immediate Appeal from said Order to this Court may materially advance the ultimate termination of this matter. Hence, this Appeal.
The issue before this Court at this time is whether the lower court acted properly in striking from Appellants’ Complaint the aforementioned sub-paragraphs, pursuant to said Pennsylvania No-Fault Motor Vehicle Insurance Act.
Section 301(a)(5) of the No-Fault Act provides inter alia :
“(a) Tort liability is abolished with respect to any injury that takes place in this State in accordance with the provisions of this act if such injury arises out of the maintenance or use of a motor vehicle, except that: .
(5) A person remains liable for damages for non-economic detriment if the accident results in: (Emphasis added)
(A) death or serious and permanent injury; or
(B) the reasonable value of reasonable and necessary medical and dental services, including prosthetic devices and necessary ambulance, hospital and professional nursing expenses incurred in the diagnosis, care and recovery of the victim, exclusive of diagnostic x-ray costs and rehabilitation costs in excess of one hundred dollars ($100) is in excess of seven hundred fifty dollars ($750) . . .; or
(C) medically determinable physical or mental impairment which prevents the victim from performing all or *251substantially all of the material acts and duties which constitute his usual and customary daily activities and which continues for more than sixty consecutive days; or
(D) injury which in whole or in part consists of cosmetic disfigurement which is permanent, irreparable and severe . . . ”
I accept as an accurate statement the majority’s evaluation of the above quoted section where the majority has found:
“Section 301(a)(5) specifically provides that damages for non-economic detriment are recoverable if the threshold requirements are met. ‘Non-economic detriment’ means ‘pain, suffering, inconvenience, physical impairment, and other non-pecuniary damage recoverable under the tort law applicable to injury arising out of the maintenance or use of a motor vehicle.”4 Damage items such as medical expenses,5 financial setbacks in one’s business, and loss of pecuniary value of a spouse’s services are not ‘non-economic detriment,’ and therefore do not come within the ambit of section 301(a)(5). Indeed recovery for these damage items is provided for in the Act itself.6
However, I disagree with the majority’s conclusion which followed immediately the above quote where it held “Appellants nevertheless would have us hold that such damages are recoverable in a tort action once the threshold requirements of section 301(a)(5) are met.”
I do not think that is what Appellants are seeking. Rather, I believe Appellants desire the opportunity to plead their economic losses and, to the extent only that same are *252relevant to the proof of their non-economic losses, prove their economic losses.
I believe that the lower court exceeded its scope of review in striking the sub-paragraphs of Appellants’ Complaint which dealt with Appellants’ economic losses, and further, I disagree with the majority’s affirmance of the lower court’s Order.
To plead — to prove — to recover, are three distinct and separate issues. Certainly, I do not believe that Appellants should be able to plead, prove and recover for economic damages previously compensated by a No-Fault Insurance obligor. Moreover, by this dissent, I do not intend to encourage double recoveries nor suggest that litigants may proceed contrary to the purpose of the Pennsylvania No-Fault Act.
However, I do believe de minimus that Appellants may plead economic losses and, to the extent that same are relevant to the proof of their non-economic losses, prove same. Thereafter, it would be necessary for the trial judge to submit to the factfinders the amounts of compensation previously received from a litigant’s No-Fault Insurance obligor and, if necessary, mold any verdict to avoid double recoveries.
I find that once a litigant meets the threshold requirements of Section 301(a)(5), all economic and non-economic damages, detriments and losses may be pleaded notwithstanding any prior compensation by said litigant’s No-Fault Insurance obligor.
For the above reasons, it is my opinion that providing the statutorily imposed threshold requirements of Section 1009.-301(a)(5) are met, Appellants may plead and possibly be afforded an opportunity of proving economic losses in an effort to measure the amount of non-economic detriment sustained.
Accordingly, I dissent in part with the majority opinion and would reverse and remand that part of the lower court’s Order striking from Appellants’ Complaint those items of *253economic loss, specifically sub-paragraphs 8(a), 8(b), 8(h), and 11(c).
I concur with the majority in affirming that part of the lower court’s Order striking from the Appellants’ Complaint paragraph 8(g) (the necessity of repeating a year of law school), for the reason that same more properly falls under the heading of “pain, suffering and inconvenience”, which Appellants pleaded elsewhere in their Complaint.
Finally, I concur in the opinion of the majority of this Court wherein it held that providing the threshold requirements of Section 1009.301(a)(5) are met, a cause of action for consortium may be maintained and, therefore, I join with the majority in reversing and remanding that part of the lower court’s Order striking from appellants’ complaint paragraph 11(a).

 40 P.S., Sec. 1009.103.

 The damages plaintiffs list which concern purchase of a neck brace and home traction unit, we view as an ‘allowable expense’ under Sec. 1009.103 and thus, economic loss.

 Medical expenses are ‘allowable expenses’ under Sec. 1009.103 and thus are recoverable in full under Sec. 1009.202(a), provided such expenses are ‘reasonable.’ Financial setbacks in one’s business are recoverable, with limitations under Sec. 1009.202(b). Pecuniary loss of a spouse’s services are recoverable, with certain limitations, under Sec. 1009.202(c).”