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Virginia Farm Bureau Mutual Insurance Co. v. Frazier2/25/1994
OPINION BY JUSTICE A. CHRISTIAN COMPTON
In this automobile insurance case, the question presented is whether the trial court erred in permitting parents to recover under the property damage provisions of uninsured motorist coverage for medical expenses and loss of services as the result of injury to their minor child.
The facts are undisputed. In March 1986, Lisa D. Frazier, age 17, was injured in a motor vehicle collision in Marshall, Virginia, while riding in a car operated by Michael C. King, an uninsured motorist. Appellees Richard Frazier and Karin Frazier, who are Lisa's parents, incurred medical expenses of $34,190.44 for the treatment of their daughter's injuries.
The daughter qualified as an insured under two separate policies of automobile insurance jointly issued by appellants Virginia Farm
Bureau Mutual Insurance Company and Early Settlers Insurance Company (collectively, the insurer). Each policy contained uninsured motorist coverage with bodily injury limits of $25,000 for each person injured as the result of one accident.
In January 1989 in the Circuit Court of Fauquier County, the daughter obtained a $27,000 judgment against King in a tort action for her accident related injuries. Because the insurer's total stacked bodily injury limits available for uninsured motorist coverage was $50,000, the insurer paid $27,000 to satisfy the Fauquier judgment.
Following proceedings in the Superior Court of the District of Columbia and in the United States Bankruptcy Court for the Eastern District of Virginia involving King, which are not relevant here, the parents obtained a default judgment against King in May 1991 in the Circuit Court of Spotsylvania County for $36,015.49, which included the medical expenses of $34,190.44, and apparently a sum for loss of services. In June 1991, the insurer paid the parents $23,000, thus exhausting the bodily injury limits under the uninsured motorist coverage.
In the meantime, the parents had instituted the present action on the insurance contracts against the insurer in the Circuit Court of Page County. In an amended motion for judgment filed in July 1991, the parents sought to enforce the Spotsylvania judgment, subject to a credit for the June 1991 payment.
In a July 1992 hearing on the parents' motion for summary judgment, the parties agreed that there was no factual dispute and that the sole issue involved interpretation of the insurance contracts, which have identical substantive provisions. Upon consideration of the pleadings, the prior proceedings, and argument of counsel, the court ruled in favor of the parents. The court found that the parents had "the right to recover under the Property Damage limits of the applicable policies," which totalled $35,000 when stacked.
Therefore, the court entered judgment against the insurer for $24,868.67, after applying the credit. This sum represented the amount of the unpaid Spotsylvania judgment plus prejudgment interest of about $13,000. We awarded the insurer this appeal from the final order, limited to consideration of the foregoing issue.
In the interpretation of any contract, including contracts of insurance, the document must be construed as a whole. The following provisions of the uninsured motorist coverage of the insurance contracts at issue are pertinent to this controversy.
They provide that the insurer will pay "in accordance with" the Virginia uninsured motorist statute, "all sums which the insured . . . shall be legally entitled
Page 1 2 3 4 5 Virginia Personal Injury Attorneys
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