Allocca. v. York Insurance Company of Maine

Parents Theresa Allocca and Timothy Allen Davison, filed this action in their individual capacities, and Davison also filed as personal representative of the Estate of Timothy "Asti" Davison. Asti was fatally shot while operating a vehicle that an assailant, operating another vehicle, had forced onto a median on an interstate highway. The Parents sought uninsured motorist (UM) benefits based on several automobile insurance policies issued by defendants York Insurance Company of Maine, Allstate Insurance Company, and Horace Mann Teachers Insurance Company. The Superior Court granted summary judgment in favor of the insurers, concluding that neither any of the policies nor Maine’s UM statute provided coverage for the loss associated with Asti’s death. The Maine Supreme Court affirmed: "[a]lthough the conduct of the person who killed Asti was indisputably deliberate and not accidental, there is no evidence in the record that it was foreseeable to Asti himself, and so, based on that approach, his death would be viewed as 'accidental.' ... describing an intentional act, such as an intentional killing, as an 'accident' stretches the plain meaning of that word too far." Without addressing the superior court’s conclusion that the UM coverage in the policies was not applicable because the loss did not arise from the "use" of a motor vehicle, the Supreme Court concluded as a matter of law that Asti’s death was not caused by an "accident." View "Allocca. v. York Insurance Company of Maine" on Justia Law