Court Opinion

ID: 9857294
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-09-24 14:28:38.700308+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T09:38:26.157389
License: Public Domain

JUSTICE WALLACE, JR.,
dissenting.
I respectfully dissent. I would affirm the judgment of the Appellate Division substantially for the reasons expressed by Judge Coburn. I add only the following brief comments.
The insurance policy provides that “[t]he bodily injury ... must be caused by an accident arising out of the ownership, maintenance or use of an uninsured motor vehicle.” In Lindstrom v. Hanover Ins. Co., 138 N.J. 242, 649 A.2d 1272 (1994), this Court addressed a similar issue in considering the plaintiffs claim for personal injury protection (PIP) benefits resulting from a gunshot wound inflicted in a drive-by shooting. The language of the PIP statute provided for benefits for bodily injury sustained “‘as a result of an accident ... as a pedestrian, caused by an automobile or by an object propelled by or from an automobile.’ ” Id. at 245, 649 A.2d 1272 (quoting N.J.S.A. 39:6A-4). In concluding that the plaintiff was entitled to PIP benefits, the Court declared that beyond the requirement of an object being propelled from an automobile,
*537the automobile did more than provide a setting or an enhanced opportunity for the assault. In addition to allowing the assailant to be at the place of attack, it furnished the assailant with what he must have assumed would be both anonymity and a means of escape. The assailant would not likely have committed such an act of apparently random violence without the use of a car.
[Id. at 252, 649 A.2d 1272.]
In Shaw v. City of Jersey City, 174 N.J. 567, 811 A.2d 404 (2002), the plaintiff police officer was injured when the driver of a car intentionally struck him. The plaintiff sought uninsured motorist benefits. This Court held that the driver’s intentional act of hitting the police officer was an accident within the meaning of uninsured motorist coverage for injury caused by an accident. The Court discussed the purpose of UM coverage to provide maximum remedial protection to the innocent victims of financially irresponsible motorists and to relieve the troubled Unsatisfied Judgment Fund. The Court said that
whether the uninsured tortfeasor acted intentionally does not control the availability of uninsured motorist coverage, which pays benefits directly to the injured insured. The intentional acts of the tortfeasor are relevant only to justify a denial of third-parly liability coverage under an intentional acts exclusion or clause of similar import in a liability policy applicable to the “uninsured motor vehicle.”
[Id. at 575, 811 A.2d 404.]
The Court reasoned that “extending [UM] coverage irrespective of whether the insured’s injury was caused by an intentional act maximizes the scope of the protection available under N.J.S.A. 17:28-1.1, thereby giving effect to its legislative intent.” Ibid.
Based on our case law, in my view, the Appellate Division appropriately concluded that:
We perceive no principled basis in these circumstances, a random, drive-by shooting, for treating UM coverage differently from PIP coverage on the central question of whether there was a sufficient nexus between the use of the automobile and the injury. The role played by the automobile in this case is no different from the role it played in Lindstrom, and we perceive no basis for concluding that there would be any difference between the objectively-reasonable coverage expectations under either statute, particularly since both statutes are to be construed broadly, extending coverage whenever reasonable.
[Livsey, supra, 396 N.J.Super, at 377-78, 934 A.2d 61.]
The majority agrees that plaintiffs injury qualifies as an “accident” under the UM statute, but finds insufficient nexus between *538the accident and the operation or use of an uninsured vehicle necessary to permit UM benefits to plaintiff. I cannot agree with that conclusion. The operation or use of the uninsured vehicle provided the “opportunity for the assault” and would not likely have occurred “without the use of a car.” Lindstrom, supra, 138 N.J. at 252, 649 A.2d 1272. Consequently, I conclude that there was a sufficient nexus between the use of an automobile and the shooting for plaintiff to receive UM benefits.
Beyond that, under the majority’s view, if plaintiff had been struck by a person in a car wielding a baseball bat, there would be UM benefits, but the firing of a weapon from that same vehicle does not permit justifying UM benefits. That is a difference that I do not understand. In my view, the result should be the same because in each case there is a sufficient nexus between the use of the vehicle and the injury to justify UM benefits.
JUSTICES LONG and ALBIN join in this opinion.
For reversal and remandment — Chief Justice RABNER and Justices LaVECCHIA, RIVERA-SOTO and HOENS — 4.
For affirmance — Justices LONG, ALBIN and WALLACE — 3.