Court Opinion

ID: 9720397
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-26 08:29:11.326492+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T18:24:17.197040
License: Public Domain

POCHÉ, J.,—
I respectfully dissent.
To those whose professional lives allow them the privilege of reading daily the Insurance Code1 it is ingrained lore that the writers of that document in sections 11580.8 and 11580.9 went out of their legislative way to put in letters six feet tall that they were upset with the volume of litigation identical to that at hand which was constipating the court systems, i.e., coverage litigation among and between insurance carriers. For the purpose of minimizing coverage litigation a statutory scheme of conclusive presumptions was established. (§ 11580.8; Lumbermens Mutual Casualty Co. v. Agency Rent-A-Car, Inc. (1982) 126 Cal.App.3d 764, 767-768 [180 Cal.Rptr. 546].)
*257Today’s decision insures that the Legislature’s chance of minimizing such litigation is minimal. It guarantees that despite the clear wording of the statute involved and the interpretative case authority, gossamer distinctions should be found, ad hoc fairness determinations should be made and litigation should be encouraged.
The only question as to which there is disagreement in this court is whether the Orsetti rig—Orsetti’s tractor and the two R & A trailers—constitutes “the same motor vehicle” within the meaning of section 11580.9, subdivision (d). That statute applies the conclusive presumption that a policy which describes or rates a vehicle provides primary coverage.2 The Royal policy, issued to R & A Trucking Co. (R & A), describes four flat bed trailers, two of which the trial court found to be the trailers involved in the accident. That policy states, however, that its coverage will be excess whenever “a covered auto which is a trailer is connected to another vehicle” not owned by the insured. Transport’s policy, issued to Orsetti, describes in its fleet indorsement the Orsetti-owned tractor involved in the accident and some nine entries for “Unidentified Semi-Trailer.” Since the Royal policy describes the trailers as owned automobiles, is it conclusively presumed to provide primary coverage of the trailers, despite the express language of the policy? The statutory scheme of section 11580.9 compels the answer: yes. The statute’s effect is to make Royal and Transport primary coinsurers of the trailers and Transport a primary insurer of the tractor. (§ 11580.9, subd. (d); Mission Ins. Co. v. Hartford Ins. Co. (1984) 155 Cal.App.3d 1199, 1213 [202 Cal.Rptr. 635].)
The majority notes language in the Mission opinion to the effect that the Hartford policy described only the tractor as an “owned automobile” while the Mission policy described both the semitrailer and the pull trailer as “owned automobiles.” {Id., at p. 1213.) On this basis the majority purports to distinguish the instant fact pattern. They explain that in the case at hand “the Transport policy described and rated both the truck-tractor and the trailers as ‘owned automobiles.’ ” (Maj. opn., ante, pp. 255-256.) They reach this conclusion by finding that the nine unidentified trailers listed in the Transport policy indorsement were trailers owned by R & A. The indorsement does not in any way identify these trailers, a fact from which the majority concludes the trailers could not have been other old trailers owned by Orsetti listed as “unidentified” because they were unidentifiable. {Ibid.) Whatever the rightness or wrongness of this factual conclusion (which they *258buttress by a gratuitous suggestion as to how Orsetti could have identified its owned trailers had it been intending to insure them) the fact remains that, even assuming the unidentified trailers were those belonging to R & A, this coverage pattern is exactly the pattern of Mission.
In Mission the Hartford policy covered the tractor and by indorsement “two unidentified semitrailers and two unidentified pull trailers.” (Mission Ins. Co. v. Hartford Ins. Co., supra, 155 Cal.App.3d at p. 1203.) In Mission the Hartford policyholder was the owner of the tractor who—like Orsetti in the case at hand—had entered into a subhaul agreement with the party in possession of the trailers. (Ibid.) Pursuant to that agreement the owner of the tractor caused his insurance agent to obtain for the possessor of the trailers a certificate of insurance coverage and the indorsement covering the unidentified trailers from his insurer, Hartford. (Ibid.) Thus, the policy issued to the tractor owner in Mission “covered the Freightliner tractor and any trailers attached to the tractor at the time of the accident.” (Id., at p. 1204.)
I can find absolutely no way to say that unidentified trailers listed in the indorsement to the Hartford policy which insured the tractor in Mission are in any way different from the unidentified trailers listed in the policy indorsement to the Transport policy which insured the tractor here. Mission implicitly concluded that such trailers were not “owned automobiles.” (Id., at p. 1213.) On precisely the same facts the majority concludes that similar unidentified trailers are “owned automobiles.” (Maj. opn., ante, p. 256.) This is, I submit, nothing other than a factual finding masquerading as a legal conclusion. It is, furthermore a conclusion derived from an exceedingly sparse factual record.
The majority asserts, without evidence in the record, that Transport charged the additional premium in recognition of the fact that it was assuming the risk of providing primary coverage on the trailers and that “the premium charged R & A by Royal was undoubtedly based on the fact that Royal was assuming primary coverage for the trailers when pulled by a truck tractor owned by R & A, but only excess coverage when the trailers were pulled by another vehicle.” (Maj. opn., ante, p. 256.) Whatever the truth of the matter, these statements are after the fact mindreading.
The majority defends its result as “fair” and “just.” I render no opinion as to the fairness or unfairness of their result, because that choice is not mine to make. The Legislature, to inject predictability into such disputes, has mandated the presumptions set out in section 11580.9. The majority undermines the clear mandate of the Legislature by creating shifting definitions of the terms “owned automobile.” Because the majority’s holding is in *259conflict with the earlier opinion in Mission Ins. Co. v. Hartford Ins. Co., supra, 155 Cal.App.3d 1199,1 cannot concur in it. I would reverse the judgment.
A petition for a rehearing was denied March 12, 1987. Poché, J., was of the opinion that the petition should be granted. Appellant’s petition for review by the Supreme Court was denied April 30, 1987.

Unless otherwise indicated, all further statutory references are to the Insurance Code.

Section 11580.9, subdivision (d) provides in pertinent part: “where two or more policies affording valid and collectible liability insurance apply to the same motor vehicle or vehicles in an occurrence out of which a liability loss shall arise, it shall be conclusively presumed that the insurance afforded by that policy in which the motor vehicle is described or rated as an owned automobile shall be primary and the insurance afforded by any other policy or policies shall be excess.”