Court Opinion

ID: 9469424
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-05 02:40:07.325248+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T17:41:22.784756
License: Public Domain

A. LEON HIGGINBOTHAM, Jr., Circuit Judge,
dissenting.
While I agree with the majority that there is some dispute over whether Earl Drummond (the renter of the car) gave the car directly to Kenneth Bodie or to Ernie Drummond, who in turn gave it to Kenneth Bodie, I do not agree that the resolution of this fact has a material bearing on the legal issue of Continental’s liability under the policy in question. I, therefore, respectfully dissent from the majority’s view that a remand is necessary in this case.
There is no dispute that Earl Drummond rented the car for the purpose of transporting members of his family to his daughter’s wedding. There is also no question that Kenneth Bodie, the driver of the car, was, in fact, transporting members of the wedding party when the accident occurred. I am persuaded that the district court properly granted summary judgment against Continental, because the car was being used for Earl Drummond’s purposes.
In Buntin v. Continental Insurance Co., 583 F.2d 1201, 1207 (3d Cir. 1978), we concluded “[w]ithout question, the rental agency, and in turn its insurer, should have foreseen that the rented vehicle might well have come into the hands of a person other than the rentee.” The majority recognizes this principle when they write that “[ajbsence of the permittee of Preferred [Earl Drummond], Continental’s insured, from the vehicle at the time of the accident similarly does not necessarily bar coverage of Bodie.” Majority Opinion, at 440. Further, in Maryland Casualty Co. v. Marshbank, 226 F.2d 637 (3d Cir. 1955), we concluded that the critical question in a coverage case is whether the car was being used with the permission of the named insured. There, a father permitted his son to borrow the family car for the purpose of taking his date and another couple to a *441movie theater. The son, in turn, relinquished the driving of the car to the other young man. In holding that this second driver was covered our court wrote:
In the present case the use to which the Marshbank automobile was being put at the time of the accident was precisely the use which Marshbank, the named insured, had agreed to permit, namely the conveyance of the four young people, including Charles, for the purpose of attending the moving picture theatre. In order to be used for this purpose it was necessary for the automobile to be operated by someone and, as Marshbank testified, he left that matter entirely up to his son.
226 F.2d at 640. I think a fair reading of the Buntin and Marshbank opinions leads to the conclusion that, since the car was being used for the purpose Earl Drummond intended, it is of no legal significance whether Kenneth Bodie received the car directly from Earl Drummond or from Ernie Drum-mond who received it from Earl.