Lead
AFTER REMAND
After a minor traffic accident, the plaintiff was assaulted by the driver of the other car. The lower courts granted no-fault benefits to the plaintiff, but we reverse and remand the case to the district court for entry of a judgment in favor of the defendant.
i
This case arises from an incident that took place in January 1993. It was submitted to the district court on stipulated facts, which the court summarized in this fashion:
On the date stated in the complaint, the Plaintiff was an operator of a motor vehicle on a public highway, I believe, leaving the Silverdome or the Palace or something like that, and he was struck from the rear by a motorist who was operating а motor vehicle.
It was a minor impact, and the impact, per se, itself, caused no injury whatsoever to Mr. Kenneth Morosini. However, it was an impact which would give rise to the requirement to determine if property damage had occurred, and if property damage had occurred, it would be necessary, under thе rules of a—for vehicle operators, for the operators to exchange identification information, such as driver’s license and insurance and registration information.
Mr. Morosini exited his vehicle, was in the process of examining the area where he believed a slight impact had occurred, and he was assaulted by the driver of the other vehicle resulting in injuries.
He has brought this action against Citizens Insurance Company, who is Mr. Morosini’s own personal-injury protection carrier, for recoupment of medical expenses arising out of the treatment for the assault.
The parties further stipulated that Mr. Morosini’s damages, if liability were found, would be $2,500.
The question before the district court was whether Mr. Morosini’s insurer—Citizens Insurance Company of America—was obliged to pay first-party no-fault benefits.
Under personal protection insurance an insurer is liable to pay benefits for accidental bodily injury arising out of the ownership, operation, maintenance or use of a motor vehicle as a motor vehicle, subject to the provisions of this chapter.
The district court granted judgment to Mr. Morosini, finding a sufficient nexus between the injuries and the use of a motor vehicle as a motor vehicle. The court reasoned that the traffic accident gave rise to a statutory obligation to stop and exchange information,
The circuit court affirmed, saying that “[t]he accident precipitated the assault, and the assault occurred as an integral part of the continuum of the accident.”
Citizens applied to this Court for leave to appeal. In lieu of granting leave, we remanded the case to the Court of Appeals for reconsideration in light of McKenzie v ACIA,
On remand, the Court of Appeals issued a short opinion adhering to its earlier conclusion.
Once again, Citizens has applied to this Court for leave to appeal.
n
As one readily can see from the first opinion of the Court of Appeals,
In Thornton v Allstate Ins Co,
Marzonie v ACIA,
Bourne v Farmers Ins Exchange,
Finally, there is McKenzie, which was decided aftеr the Court of Appeals issued its first opinion in the present case. In McKenzie, two men were hospitalized after inhaling carbon monoxide fumes from a propane heater in a camper/trailer that was attached to the back of a pickup truck. Examining closely the syntax selected by the Legislature, this Court observеd that “the phrase ‘use of a motor vehicle as a motor vehicle’ would appear to invite contrasts with situations in which a motor vehicle is not used as a motor vehicle.”
m
Each of these decisions is instructive, and each supports our conclusion that the Legislature crafted the no-fault statute in a manner that excludes the facts of the present case. From these decisions we learn:
• Coverage is not mandated by the fact that the injury occurred within a moving vehicle, or by the fact that the driver believed that the passenger entered the vehicle for the purpose of being transported. Thornton.
• The focus is on the relationship between the injury and the use of a motor vehicle as a motor vehicle, not on the intent of the assailant. Marzonie.
• Incidental involvement of a motor vehicle does not give rise to coverage under the language enacted by the Legislature, even if assaultive behavior occurred at moré than one location, and the vehicle was used to transport the victim from one place to the other. Bourne.
• The statute authorizes coverage in the event of an assault only if it is “closely related to the transportational function of motor vehicles.” McKenzie.
These cases can lead only to the conclusion that the facts of the present case are not within the coverage intended by the Legislature. In the mind of the second motorist, the assault may have been motivated by closely antecedent events that involved the use of a motor vehicle as a motor vehicle, but the assault itself was a separate occurrence. The plaintiff was not injured in a traffiс accident—he was injured by another person’s rash and excessive response to these events. The assault in this case was not “closely related to the transportational
For these reasons, we reverse the judgments of the Court of Appeals, the circuit court, and the district court, and we remand this casе to the district court for entry of a judgment in favor of defendant Citizens Insurance Company. MCR 7.302(F)(1).
Notes
The statutory phrase is “personal protection insurance benefits”—also known as “first-party” or “pip” benefits. McKelvie v ACIA,
MCL 257.618, 257.619; MSA 9.2318, 9.2319.
The circuit court later denied rehearing.
Reh den August 27, 1997 (Docket No. 186760).
We also have received from Auto Club Insurance Associаtion a motion for leave to appear as amicus curiae. We grant the motion.
Some internal quotation marks have been deleted.
Bialochowski v Cross Concrete Pumping Co,
We agree -with the main point of Justice Cavanagh’s separate opinion—injuries from an intentional personal assault on a driver of a motor vehicle (or in this case on one who had a few moments before been driving a motor vehicle) do not bear a sufficient causal relationship to the use of a motor vehicle to qualify for first-party no-fault benefits. However, we regard McKenzie, supra, as being applicable to the circumstances of this case because Mr. Morosini’s injuries were not caused by a force “closely related to the transportational function of motor vehicles,” id., but rather by a physical attack on his person.
Concurrence Opinion
(concurring). I agree with the decision to deny coverage in this case. However, I disagree with the majority’s reliance on the McKenzie v ACIA,
The majority leads us through this Court’s history of interpreting the relationship between MCL 500.3105(1); MSA 24.13105(1), and facts where a motorist has suffered an intentional physical assault. Bourne v Farmers Ins Exchange,
Because the instant facts provide no dispute that the motorists were operating their vehicles as motor vehicles on a public highway, we need not look further into the “use” or “function” of the vehicles. This is not a case where, as the McKenzie majority notes, “a motor vehicle is [being] used for other purposes, e.g., as a housing facility of sorts, as an advertising display (such as at a car dealership), as a foundation for construction equipment, as a mobile public library, or perhaps even when a car is on display in a museum.”
Plaintiff and his attacker were operating motor vehicles on a public highway when the attacker struck plaintiff from the rear. No injury resulted from this collision. However, once plaintiff exited his vehicle in order to exchange insurance information and to examine the area where the impact occurred, he was assaulted and injured by the other motorist. Plaintiffs injury arose out of an intentional assault that occurred after the two motor vehicles were being used as motor vehicles. As in Bourne, where the plaintiff was attacked during a carjacking, this plaintiff suffered
While the injuries were perhaps “foreseeably identifiable” with the occupational or commercial use of a motor vehicle as a taxicab, the relation оf the gunshot wound to the functional use of a motor vehicle as a motor vehicle was at most merely “but for,” incidental, and fortuitous. [425 Mich 661 .]
In Marzonie, the plaintiff argued with another motorist and was later shot by that person while driving his car. This Court stated that the injuries did not arise out of the use of the motor vehicle as a motor vehicle:
The involvement of the automobiles was incidental and fortuitous. Although Mr. Oaks says that the plaintiff’s car was moving toward him at a “creep,” the shooting arose out of a dispute between two individuals, one of whom happened to be occupying a vehicle at the moment of the shooting. [441 Mich 534 .]
Finally, in Bourne, we held that carjacking injuries did not arise out of the use of the plaintiffs vehicle as a motor vehicle:
The carjacker simply struck plaintiff. Hence, plaintiffs vehicle was at best the situs of the injury, which is not a sufficient condition to establish the requisite causal connection between the injury and the vehicle. [449 Mich 200 .]
In the instant case, the Court of Appеals granted plaintiff recovery by holding that plaintiffs injuries arose from an activity normally associated with the use of a vehicle as a motor vehicle.
getting out of the vehicle to inspect for damages from an accident is a normal activity associated with the use of a vehicle as a motor vehiclе. Because there was a sufficient causal nexus between the injuries sustained by plaintiff in the assault and the use of the motor vehicle as a motor vehicle, defendant insurer is liable under § 3105(1).
The Court of Appeals essentially reasoned that being assaulted while fulfilling statutory duties to exchange insurance information is a normal risk of driving. I disagree and continue to adhere to this Court’s statement:
[W]e do not agree that assaults are part of “the normal risk” of motoring. [Bourne,449 Mich 200 , n 3.]
In that same footnote, we recognized that there have been cases where objects were projected at, or dropped on, vehicles, which resulted in an injury. Saunders v DAIIE,
Plaintiffs injuries arose out of the blows inflicted on him by another motorist. The connection to the use of vehicles as motor vehicles preceding the attack provides insufficient “but for” causation. I am unpersuaded that we should depart from the general rule when the causal connection between using the vehicles as motor vehicles is broken by a physical personal assault.
Dissenting Opinion
I dissent from the majority opinion in this case on the basis of the reasoning set forth in the Court of Appeals opinions.