An automobile liability policy’s “each person” limit applied to all damages, including loss of consortium damages, arising from bodily injury to one person. (Jones v. IDS Property Casualty Insurance Co. (2018) Cal.App.5th 2018 WL 4579767)
Facts
Mark Jones was seriously injured in an automobile accident caused by Richard Buhler. Mr. Jones and his wife Melanie Jones later sued Mr. Buhler, with Mr. Jones seeking damages for bodily injury and Mrs. Jones seeking damages for loss of consortium.
At the time of the accident, Mr. Buhler was the named insured on an IDS Property Casualty Insurance Company (IDS) auto policy with bodily injury limits of $250,000 each person / $500,000 each occurrence. The policy’ss limit of liability provision stated as follows: “[¶] 1. The bodily injury liability limits for each person is the maximum we will pay as damages for bodily injury, including damages for care and loss of services, to one person per occurrence. [¶] 2. Subject to the bodily injury liability for each person, the bodily injury liability limit for each occurrence is the maximum we will pay as damages for bodily injury, including damages for care and loss of services, to two or more persons in one occurrence.”
Mr. and Mrs. Jones obtained a judgment of $1,500,000 in their personal injury action against Mr. Buhler, with Mr. Jones receiving an award of $1,350,000 for his bodily injury and Mrs. Jones receiving an award of $150,000 for her loss of consortium. IDS paid the policy’s $250,000 each person limit in partial satisfaction of Mr. Buhler’s liability to Mr. and Mrs. Jones.
Mr. and Mrs. Jones then filed a declaratory relief action against IDS, seeking a ruling that the IDS policy provided $250,000 in limits for Mr. Jones’ claim as well as $250,000 in limits for Mrs. Jones’ claim, so that the total amount available was the $500,000 each occurrence limit. The trial court ruled in favor of IDS, holding that Mr. Jones’ bodily injury claim and Mrs. Jones’ loss of consortium claim were both subject to the policy’s $250,000 each person limit rather than the $500,000 each occurrence limit. Mr. and Mrs. Jones appealed.
Holding
The California Court of Appeal affirmed the declaratory judgment in favor of IDS. The IDS policy provided that the $250,000 each person limit “is the maximum we will pay as damages for bodily injury, including damages for care and loss of services, to one person per occurrence.” After a comprehensive review of California case law involving similar policy language, the appellate court concluded that the IDS policy sufficiently apprised the insured, Mr. Buhler, that the lower $250,000 each person limit applied to all damages, including loss of consortium damages, arising from bodily injury to any one person. Thus, the $250,000 each person limit applied to both Mr. Jones’ claim for bodily injury and Mrs. Jones’ claim for loss of consortium. Accordingly, IDS had already paid everything it owed under the policy.
Comment
An insurer may limit its liability in accidents were loss of consortium damages are claimed by expressly providing that such damages are subject to the “each person” limitation. (Abellon v. Hartford Ins. Co. (1985) 167 Cal.App.3d 21, 33.) Here, the policy language in the IDS policy was slightly different from the policy language in some earlier cases in which courts had held that the “each person” limit applied to all damages, including loss of consortium damages, arising from bodily injury to one person. (See, e.g., United Services Automobile Assn. v. Warner (1976) 64 Cal.App.3d 957 and Mercury Ins. Co. v. Ayala (2004) 116 Cal.App.4th 1198.) Nevertheless, the appellate court held that IDS’s policy language was “sufficient” to result in an aggregation of any damages suffered by the spouse claiming loss of consortium with the damages suffered by the spouse claiming the actual bodily injury. A reasonable insured reading the policy would understand this.