Low, Ball & Lynch’s

WEEKLY LAW RESUME

September 7, 2006  Issue  By: Ray Coates

 

Coverage - Automobile Exclusion - Concurrent Cause

 

Twila Prince v. United National Insurance Company

(August 24, 2006)

 

Court of Appeal, Second District

 

General liability policies commonly contain an exclusion for injuries arising out of an automobile owned, operated, rented, or loaned to any insured. This case discusses the application of such an exclusion to the death of two young children negligently left in a vehicle on a hot day.

 

The parents of two young children sued the County of Los Angeles, Trinity Children and Family Services, Leslie Smoot, and A Child’s Place Preschool. Leslie Smoot had been awarded foster care of two children by Los Angeles County. She was licensed by Trinity to act as a foster parent and owned the preschool. Ms. Smoot left the children in her car outside the preschool, and both children died. The automobile carrier for the Smoots settled with the parents. United National Insurance Company insured Trinity for acts of foster parents licensed or certified under their authority. Trinity tendered its defense to United National, and United National refused to defend and indemnify. United relied on an exclusion for bodily injury arising out the ownership, maintenance, use, or entrustment to others of any automobile owned, operated, rented, or loaned to any insured.

 

The parents filed suit against United National based upon an assignment for Smoot and the other insurers. United demurred to the complaint, and the trial court sustained the demurrer, concluding that the accident arose out the use of the vehicle. The parents appealed.

 

The Court of Appeal affirmed. The parents argued that the automobile exclusion did not apply because Smoot’s negligence was unrelated to her use of the vehicle. The Court noted that California has held that where there are concurrent causes of injury, one auto-related and the other non-auto related, the automobile exclusion will not apply. However, this rationale only applies where there are two negligent acts or omissions of an insured, one of which, independent of the excluded cause, renders the insured liable for the resulting injuries.

 

The Court noted that no prior cases had resolved the coverage issue specific to this set of facts. The Court observed that the test used by California cases to determine if the automobile exclusion applies is whether the automobile was a predominating cause or substantial factor in the injury that is claimed. In this case, the Court found that the relationship between the vehicle and the injuries sufficient to trigger the exclusion. Both children died when left in an overheated vehicle. This type of injury occurs almost exclusively in a motor vehicle. The combination of a small, confined glass and metal space and a sunny day created a unique environment in which heat was trapped and hazardous temperatures developed within a brief period of time. The vehicle thus became the instrumentality for the injury.

 

Furthermore, there were no separate or independent acts of negligence, unrelated to the use of the vehicle. Smoot’s conduct was integrally connected to the use of the vehicle. She left the children unattended and strapped in their car seats in the hot vehicle for more than six hours. Thus, her negligence was not disassociated from the use of the vehicle. Her abandonment of the children in the vehicle subjected them to the conditions that caused their deaths. Therefore, the automobile exclusion applied. The judgment was affirmed.

 

COMMENT

 

This opinion reiterates the rule that, where a vehicle is a predominating cause of injury and no negligence exists independent of the use of the vehicle, an automobile exclusion will apply.

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