RAYMOND CLOUD, APPELLANT,
v.
SHELBY MUTUAL INSURANCE COMPANY OF SHELBY, OHIO, APPELLEE

Fla. 3d DCA | 1971-05-18
No. 69-893
Before CHARLES CARROLL, HEN-DRY and SWANN, JJ.
248 So. 2d 217 Florida District Court of Appeal, Third District (1971) Caution
Cited by 54 cases

AI-generated. These summaries, headnotes, and key points are machine-generated and may contain errors or omissions. Always verify against the full opinion text below. Not legal advice.


Holding

The court held that an intentional act does not necessarily exclude coverage if the injury was not intentionally caused, and a genuine issue of material fact exists regarding the insured's intent to cause harm.


Headnotes

[1] An "intentional injury exclusion clause" in a liability insurance policy is not triggered unless the insured acted with the specific intent to cause harm to a third party…

[2] The rule that a tortfeasor intends the natural and probable consequences of his act does not apply to the construction of exclusionary provisions in accident insurance po…

Previewing 2 of 4 headnotes on this case. FLexlaw’s editorially structured points of law — every proposition, pinpointed — are reserved for members.

Join FLexlaw to unlock all legal intelligence

Facts & Procedural History

The insured, Cloud, intentionally pushed another car, injuring a passenger. His insurer, Shelby, initially denied defense based on an intentional inju…

The full statement of facts, procedural history, and disposition for this case are member content.

Join FLexlaw to unlock all legal intelligence

© FLexlaw, Inc. — AI-generated enrichments are proprietary. All rights reserved.


Opinion of the Court
HENDRY, Judge.

HENDRY, Judge.

This case has previously been before this court on a jurisdictional point.1 In the case’s present posture, plaintiff-appellant Raymond Cloud seeks review of a summary final judgment favoring defendant-appellee Shelby Mutual Insurance Company of Shelby, Ohio (“Shelby”). Cloud brought action against Shelby for breach of its automobile liability insurance contract to defend him in an automobile negligence suit for personal injuries brought by Mr. and Mrs. Miller.

On September 26, 1966, Cloud, insured under a standard auto liability policy issued by Shelby, impatiently sought to push out of his way a car blocking him in a driveway. His bumper overrode the bump*218er of the car ahead, and seriously injured Mrs. Miller, a passenger in the pushed car.

The Millers sued Cloud. Shelby declined to defend on the grounds of an exclusion from coverage: “ * * * to bodily injury or property damage caused intentionally by or at the direction of the insured * * * ” Later Shelby did defend its insured, but subject to a “reservation of rights.” Cloud alleges Shelby first secured an order dropping from the Millers’ complaint certain claims of simple negligence, which left only claims for gross negligence or intentional tort, while Shelby acted as his counsel, but then Shelby withdrew its defense. After the initial refusal to defend, Cloud hired his own attorneys, incurred costs in defending the Millers’ suit, and paid them a $9,980.00 settlement.

Cloud then sued Shelby for damages for breach of its insurance contract to defend the Miller suit and for attorney’s fees for prosecution of the suit against Shelby under § 627.0127, Fla.Stat, F.S.A.

The parties stipulated that Cloud did “intentionally push” the Miller car. Cloud alleged he “did not ‘intentionally cause’ injury to the Millers.” The trial judge first granted summary judgment for Shelby, denied a petition to rehearing, but then set aside the summary judgment as jury issues were presented. Cloud filed this “protective appeal.” The appellate history of the case is set out at note [1].

Appellant Cloud contends that the trial court erred in entering summary judgment for appellee insurance company because the policy exclusion as to intentional causation does not, as a matter of law, exclude coverage. Cloud also asserts that in Florida the “reasonably foreseeable” test of causation so familiar in tort cases has not been applied in cases dealing with accident insurance.

In recent years several courts have dealt with insurance-policy exclusions similar to that in the instant case. The majority of courts have ruled that coverage is not excluded as a matter of law where there was an “intentional act” but not an “intentionally caused” injury. “Anno., liability insurance: specific exclusion of liability for injury intentionally caused by insured,” 2 A.L.R.3d 1238 (1965). The rule has been stated in 44 Am.Jur.2d “Insurance,” § 1411, p. 259 as follows:

“The courts have generally held that injury or damage is ‘caused intentionally’ within the meaning of an ‘intentional injury exclusion clause’ if the insured has acted with the specific intent to cause harm to a third party, with the result that the insurer will not be relieved of its obligations under a liability policy containing such an exclusion unless the insured has acted with such specific intent.”

We have carefully examined the two lines of cases representing the majority rule and the minority rule. Cf. Eisenman v. Hornberger, 438 Pa. 46, 264 A.2d 673 (1970) with Wigginton v. Lumberman’s Mutual Casualty Co., 169 So.2d 170 (La. 1st Ct.App.1964). We express the view that the majority rule quoted above represents the better rule and we adopt it as governing the instant case.

The appellee insurance company’s contentions as to the public policy against obtaining insurance protecting against the insured’s own intentional acts have been systematically rejected in the cases cited in the annotation at 2 A.L.R.3d 1238 (1965). We also reject the argument that the rule is that a “tortfeasor intends the natural and probable consequences of his act” in construing the instant exclusionary provision. This court denied that “reasonably foreseeable consequences” rule has any application to accident insurance policies. Harvey v. St. Paul Western Insurance Companies, Fla.App. 1964, 166 So.2d 822; see also Gulf Life Insurance Company v. Nash, Fla.1957, 97 So.2d 4.

*219Therefore, for the reasons stated, we hold that a genuine issue of material fact exists, which precludes the entry of summary judgment.

Reversed.


Cases With Similar Vibessemantic neighbors from the corpus


Citator

Cited By (26 total)

  • Prudential Prop. & Cas. Ins. Co. v. Swindal, 622 So. 2d 467 (Fla. 1993)
    …iceties of the distinction, is left in a state of bewilderment and confusion. 97 So. 2d at 9-10 (Drew, J., for the majority in part). District courts generally have followed the rationale expressed in Nash. In Cloud v. Shelby Mutual Insurance Co., 248 So. 2d 217 (Fla. 3d DCA 1971), the insured, Cloud, pushed out of his way a car that had been blocking him in a driveway, but in so doing, he overrode the bumper of the other car and injured its passenger. The passenger sued Cloud, but Cloud’s insurer, Shelby M…
  • Grissom v. Commercial Union Ins. Co., 610 So. 2d 1299 (Fla. 1st DCA 1992)
    …owd intending to disperse them, Phoenix Ins. Co. v. Helton, 298 So. 2d 177 (Fla. 1st D.C.A.1974), or unintentionally injures a person in a car while unintentionally pushing the car which was blocking a driveway, Cloud v. Shelby Mutual Insurance Co., 248 So. 2d 217 (Fla. 3d D.C.A.1971). Running through all of these cases is an act of negligence by the insured, sometimes gross or even culpable negligence. But never has coverage been found under such policies where the insured’s act was deliberately designed to…
  • …crowd intending to disperse them, Phoenix Ins. Co. v. Helton, 298 So. 2d 177 (Fla.1st D.C.A.1974), or unintentionally injures a person in a car while intentionally pushing the car which was blocking a driveway, Cloud v. Shelby Mutual Insurance Co., 248 So. 2d 217 (Fla.3d D.C.A.1971). Running through all of these cases is an act of negligence by the insured, sometimes gross or even culpable negligence. But never has coverage been found under such policies where the insured’s act was deliberately designed to c…
    1 / 3

Previewing 3 of 26 citing cases — full citator treatment, depth of discussion, and citing context are member features.

Join FLexlaw to unlock all legal intelligence

Authorities Cited

Full citator, related cases, and AI research tools

Open in FLexlaw