Court Opinion

ID: 9672716
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-24 03:59:12.630746+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T18:16:17.958350
License: Public Domain

*632T, M. Burns, P.J.
(dissenting). I disagree with Judge Maher in that he declines to follow McPherson v Auto-Owners Ins Co, 90 Mich App 215; 282 NW2d 289 (1979), lv den 407 Mich 908 (1979), since it is based on the supreme Court’s holding in Nickerson v Citizens Mutual Ins Co, 393 Mich 324; 224 NW2d 896 (1975). In Nickerson, the Court found that physical contact with a vehicle was not necessary for a finding that a person was "occupying” the vehicle according to the terms of an insurance contract. 393 Mich 331. While the Court, in part, based its holding on the rules of interpretation of insurance contracts, the Court stated:
"[P]erhaps most significantly, as Judge McGregor and plaintiff point out, it guards against recovery based entirely upon 'fortuitous circumstance’.” 393 Mich 331.
Recent authority has also applied Nickerson to determine whether injuries arose out of the use of a motor vehicle as defined in the no-fault act. Ohio Casualty Ins Group v Robinson, 127 Mich App 138; 338 NW2d 898 (1983).
In the instant case, the claimant momentarily stepped out of the cab of the truck and climbed a few steps onto the loading dock to see if the trailer was aligned properly. Upon determining that it was, he was proceeding to the rear of the truck to unhitch the trailer when he was injured.
Plaintiff was not standing on the steps upon which he slipped and fell because of a mere coincidence. To properly use the truck it was necessary for him to climb the stairs. This created the risk which caused plaintiff’s injuries.
The vehicle in this case provided not only the occasion of the injury, McPherson, supra, p 220, but was one of the causes of the injury. The fact *633that there was an independent cause does not bar plaintiffs cause of action. As stated in Shinabarger v Citizens Mutual Ins Co, 90 Mich App 307; 282 NW2d 301 (1979):
"Where use of the vehicle is one of the causes of the injury, a sufficient causal connection is established even though there exists an independent cause * * *.
"The relationship between use of the vehicle and the injury need not approach proximate cause * * Shinabarger, p 313.
See also BASF Wyandotte Corp v Transport Ins Corp, 523 F Supp 515, 517 (ED Mich, 1981). An independent cause may be grease on the floor. Ohio Casualty, supra.
The majority, however, denies recovery because the risk of plaintiff’s injuries was not foreseeably identifiable with plaintiffs use of a tractor-trailer rig. The majority’s reliance on Block v Citizens Ins Co of America, 111 Mich App 106; 314 NW2d 536 (1981), is misguided. In that case, the plaintiff sustained disabling back injuries when she slipped and fell on ice as she returned to her employer’s van with empty cartons which were used to make deliveries. She fell before she reached the van but when she fell she came to rest under the vehicle. This Court sustained the trial court’s grant of summary judgment. The Court characterized the plaintiffs injury as a slip and fall without causal connection with the ownership, maintenance, and use of the van.
There is more continuity in plaintiffs actions in the instant case than those of the plaintiff in Block. Whereas the plaintiff in Block was merely returning to her truck with cartons after making a delivery, the plaintiff in this cause was returning to his truck after completing his visual observation *634of the positioning of the truck’s trailer. His visual observation was an integral part of the parking process of the truck. Since plaintiff intended a continued use of his truck and had only momentarily alighted from it to perform duties necessary to the proper use of the truck, I would affirm the trial court’s decision.